By Ted AYALA The news from Glendale City Treasurer Ron Barucki to the City Council Tuesday night was sobering. “This is less than stellar news about our financial markets,” warned City Manager Scott Ochoa before Barucki’s presentation of the annual report of the city’s investment portfolio. “It was another year of frustration and disappointment in […]
Marvin Hamlisch, renowned composer of stage and screen, director of the Pasadena Pops, dies at 68. By Ted AYALA Marvin Hamlisch, the revered Broadway and film composer who had recently become a fixture on the local cultural landscape through his leadership of the Pasadena Pops, died unexpectedly on Monday at age 68. Hamlisch, according to […]
By Ted AYALA Last May the Metropolitan Transportation Agency (MTA) held open houses throughout the San Gabriel Valley and Northeast Los Angeles area that detailed the progress of the contentious 710 Freeway extension. The open houses allowed the public to not only observe the various possibilities for the long-fought project, but also allowed them to […]
By Ted AYALA Is the music of the great Romantic composers of the 19th century so different from the well loved songs that modern day Broadway and the West End have produced? In the program presented at Disney Hall on Sunday afternoon, conductor Victor Vener and the California Philharmonic affirmed their belief in the old […]
By Ted AYALA Without redevelopment monies to help vitalize districts, the city is turning to creative options that allow business and communities to prosper, without hurting the city budget. Downtown Glendale, one of the city’s most powerful revenue generators, received a boost in this way from Glendale City Council in March. Ushered in were “benefit […]
By Ted AYALA Limpidity, elegance, sensuality, and charm – virtues that characterize the very best of modern French musical style. Beguiling the ear, the listener, falling under the music’s spell, may find it easy to take its ravishing beauty for granted, not realizing the toil that forged this idiom. In a 19th Century where France […]
By Ted AYALA When the Glendale Unified School District made its final approval back in spring to implement its proposal to install large, freestanding solar panels at seven school campuses in the Crescenta Valley, a success story for the district seemed to be glimmering. Saving hundreds of thousands of dollars in the panels’ lifetime, the […]
By Ted AYALA Last year’s entry in the Rose Parade was a memorable one for Glendale. Not just for its continuation as the longest consecutively participating city in the history of the parade. But also for reasons more notorious: problems with funding, organizational uncertainties, and most of all, the design of the float. The design, […]
By Ted AYALA Glendale’s venerable Alex Theatre, a fixture on Brand Boulevard since the days of Harold Lloyd and Anita Page, has been the focus of nervous speculation by the city and community alike in the wake of the dissolution of the state’s redevelopment agencies. The future of the Alex, which enjoyed a restoration and […]
Honolulu road diet cancelled but other options to be reviewed. By Ted AYALA Glendale City Council voted Tuesday night to shelve the controversial Honolulu road diet that had been proposed for Montrose and La Crescenta. The road diet – which would have reduced the amount of car lanes from four to two, and have implemented […]