Lifestyle
Lucas & Arthur Jussen release 'little diamonds' EP of lesser-known piano duets
Lucas and Arthur Jussen perform with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Christoph Eschenbach in October 2024.
Todd Rosenberg/Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association
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Todd Rosenberg/Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association
They finish each other sentences, in conversation and in music.
Brothers Lucas and Arthur Jussen have played music together as far back as they can remember. They performed for the Dutch queen as young boys. As a piano duo, they’ve taken that symbiotic connection to some of the world’s greatest concert halls.
“The strange thing is that with Arthur, I never notice when our hands touch or our heads or whatever, it’s just a very natural thing,” Lucas told NPR’s A Martínez. “I could never imagine doing that with someone else or or not doing that with Arthur.”
This month, they are releasing recordings of a set of what they call “tiny diamonds” — short waltzes and lullabies influenced by, and in some cases rejecting, French Impressionism from the late 19th century and early 20th century. There’s Debussy’s “En bateau” (“By Boat”) from his Petite Suite, alongside lesser known works by Benjamin Godard, Reynaldo Hahn, Charles Koechlin and Germaine Tailleferre.
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It’s the first volume in a trilogy of releases. The second EP, Cantus, is due out in May and will feature works by Bach, Brahms and Estonia’s Arvo Pärt (b. 1935). A final release in November 2025 will include both of Edvard Grieg’s suites of incidental music narrating the story of Norwegian peasant anti-hero Peer Gynt.
The set begins with “Les décrets indolents du hasard” (“Indolent Decrees of Chance”), the first in a series of waltzes by Venezuelan-born Hahn known as Le ruban dénoué (The Unspooled Ribbon).
Binary and ternary meters alternate between the two pianists to evoke the indolence of the title, with an echo-like effect.
Hahn, the one-time lover of French novelist Marcel Proust, primarily composed lyrical music. Even for his piano works, “you have to play them also as if you are singing,” said Lucas, 31. That’s a major challenge at the piano, which, unlike the voice or string instruments, can’t sustain a note at length, let alone indefinitely.
Dutch brothers Lucas, left, and Arthur, right, Jussen have performed together as a piano duet since they were young children.
Jesaja Hizkia/Universal Music
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Jesaja Hizkia/Universal Music
The constant switching of leads that takes place here is central to the Dutch brothers’ broader approach to the piano duo repertoire, which they have sought to expand by shedding light on lesser known pieces such as these or by commissioning new works by contemporary composers, including concertos by Joey Roukens and Fazil Say.
“I am lucky as the younger brother that I never had an older brother who really wanted to be the older brother and wanted to be the boss in music as well as in normal life,” said Arthur, 28. “When you play together, I think the most important thing is that there is no ego that wants to be the biggest ego.”
Arthur says he tries to adapt to Lucas “almost each millisecond.” When they both achieve that level of synchronicity at the keyboard, “you can can reach a state of playing where you both almost start feeling the same and the blood starts flowing the same way,” he added.
Lucas (left) and Arthur Jussen bow with conductor Christoph Eschenbach after performing Mozart’s Concerto for Two Pianos with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in October 2024.
Todd Rosenberg/Photo provided courtesy of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association
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Todd Rosenberg/Photo provided courtesy of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association
Tailleferre was the only woman in Les Six, the avant-garde group of composers formed more than a century ago in Paris. Their musical aesthetic generally rejected German romanticism and the lush style of Impressionists like Debussy.
Tailleferre’s “Valse lente” (“Slow Waltz”) has moments of subtle but confounding dissonance, “which makes you feel all the time, ‘Where is it going?’” said Lucas. “And then in the end, it resolves into this kind of beautiful, dreamy atmosphere.”
The Jussens praised the increased presence of women composers and conductors in classical music programming, a transition and reckoning that has been slow in coming.
“We would be very happy and we would feel we succeeded if people after listening to the album will say, ‘OK, that piece right there, that’s my favorite piece, just because I love the music so much,’ and that they will not say ‘I love it so much’ because she is the only woman on the record,” said Lucas.
Koechlin, who taught Tailleferre and Poulenc from Les Six, was a polymath whose interests ran the gamut from astronomy, car racing and cinema to mountaineering and mythology. Arthur expressed admiration for Koechlin’s many talents. “We can only play piano — for the rest, we’re absolutely useless,” he quipped.
Their career is one that comes with constant stress and pressure to perform, but the brothers say they remind themselves of what inspired them to play in the first place. “We try to always remember now 20 years after we started that we like it so much because if you forget that and it’s just about playing the concerts well and performing each day, then sometimes you lose the sparkle of what music can do and the magic that it has,” Arthur said.
The digital version of this story was produced by Janaya Williams. The digital version was edited by Obed Manuel.
Lifestyle
In ‘No Other Choice,’ a loyal worker gets the ax — and starts chopping
Lee Byung-hun stars in No Other Choice.
NEON
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In an old Kids in the Hall comedy sketch called “Crazy Love,” two bros throatily proclaim their “love of all women” and declare their incredulity that anyone could possibly take issue with it:
Bro 1: It is in our very makeup; we cannot change who we are!
Bro 2: No! To change would mean … (beat) … to make an effort.
I thought about that particular exchange a lot, watching Park Chan-wook’s latest movie, a niftily nasty piece of work called No Other Choice. The film isn’t about the toxic lecherousness of boy-men, the way that KITH sketch is. But it is very much about men, and that last bit: the annoyed astonishment of learning that you’re expected to change something about yourself that you consider essential, and the extreme lengths you’ll go to avoid doing that hard work.
Many critics have noted No Other Choice‘s satirical, up-the-minute universality, given that it involves a faceless company screwing over a hardworking, loyal employee. As the film opens, Man-su (Lee Byung-hun) has been working at a paper factory for 25 years; he’s got the perfect job, the perfect house, the perfect family — you see where this is going, right? (If you don’t, even after the end of the first scene, when Man-su calls his family over for a group hug while sighing, “I’ve got it all,” then I envy your blithe disinterest in how movies work. Never change, you beautiful blissful Pollyanna, you.)
He gets canned, and can’t seem to find another job in his beloved paper industry, despite going on a series of dehumanizing interviews. His resourceful wife Miri (Son Ye-jin) proves a hell of a lot more adaptable than he does, making practical changes to the family’s expenses to weather Man-su’s situation. But when foreclosure threatens, he resolves to eliminate the other candidates (Lee Sung-min, Cha Seung-won) for the job he wants at another paper factory — and, while he’s at it, maybe even the jerk (Park Hee-soon) to whom he’d be reporting.
So yes, No Other Choice is a scathing spoof of corporate culture. But the director’s true satirical eye is trained on the interpersonal — specifically the intractability of the male ego.
Again and again, the women in the film (both Son Ye-jin as Miri and the hilarious Yeom Hye-ran, who plays the wife of one of Man-su’s potential victims) entreat their husbands to think about doing something, anything else with their lives. But these men have come to equate their years of service with a pot-committed core identity as men and breadwinners; they cling to their old lives and seek only to claw their way back into them. Man-su, for example, unthinkingly channels the energy that he could devote to personal and professional growth into planning and executing a series of ludicrously sloppy murders.
It’s all satisfyingly pulpy stuff, loaded with showy, cinematic homages to old-school suspense cinematography and editing — cross-fades, reverse-angles and jump cuts that are deliberately and unapologetically Hitchcockian. That deliberateness turns out to be reassuring and crowd-pleasing; if you’re tired of tidy visual austerity, of films that look like TV, the lushness on display here will have you leaning back in your seat thinking, “This right here is cinema, goddammit.”
Narratively, the film is loaded with winking jokes and callbacks that reward repeat viewing. Count the number of times that various characters attempt to dodge personal responsibility by sprinkling the movie’s title into their dialogue. Wonder why one character invokes the peculiar image of a madwoman screaming in the woods and then, only a few scenes later, finds herself chasing someone through the woods, screaming. Marvel at Man-su’s family home, a beautifully ugly blend of traditional French-style architecture with lumpy Brutalist touches like exposed concrete balconies jutting out from every wall.
There’s a lot that’s charming about No Other Choice, which might seem an odd thing to note about such a blistering anti-capitalist screed. But the director is careful to remind us at all turns where the responsibility truly lies; say what you will about systemic economic pressure, the blood stays resolutely on Man-su’s hands (and face, and shirt, and pants, and shoes). The film repeatedly offers him the ability to opt out of the system, to abandon his resolve that he must return to the life he once knew, exactly as he knew it.
Man-su could do that, but he won’t, because to change would mean to make an effort — and ultimately men would rather embark upon a bloody murder spree than go to therapy.
Lifestyle
Austin airport to nearly double in size over next decade
AUSTIN, Texas – Austin-Bergstrom International Airport will nearly double in size over the next decade.
The airport currently has 34 gates. With the expansion projects, it will increase by another 32 gates.
What they’re saying:
Southwest, Delta, United, American, Alaska, FedEx, and UPS have signed 10-year use-and lease agreements, which outline how they operate at the airport, including with the expansion.
“This provides the financial foundation that will support our day-to-day operations and help us fund the expansion program that will reshape how millions of travelers experience AUS for decades to come,” Ghizlane Badawi, CEO of Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, said.
Concourse B, which is in the design phase, will have 26 gates, estimated to open in the 2030s. Southwest Airlines will be the main tenant with 18 gates, United Airlines will have five gates, and three gates will be for common use. There will be a tunnel that connects to Concourse B.
“If you give us the gates, we will bring the planes,” Adam Decaire, senior VP of Network Planning & Network Operations Control at Southwest Airlines said.
“As part of growing the airport, you see that it’s not just us that’s bragging about the success we’re having. It’s the airlines that want to use this airport, and they see advantage in their business model of being part of this airport, and that’s why they’re growing the number of gates they’re using,” Mayor Kirk Watson said.
Dig deeper:
The airport will also redevelop the existing Barbara Jordan Terminal, including the ticket counters, security checkpoints, and baggage claim. Concourse A will be home to Delta Air Lines with 15 gates. American Airlines will have nine gates, and Alaska Airlines will have one gate. There will be eight common-use gates.
“Delta is making a long-term investment in Austin-Bergstrom that will transform travel for years to come,” Holden Shannon, senior VP for Corporate Real Estate at Delta Air Lines said.
The airport will also build Concourse M — six additional gates to increase capacity as early as 2027. There will be a shuttle between that and the Barbara Jordan Terminal. Concourse M will help with capacity during phases of construction.
There will also be a new Arrivals and Departures Hall, with more concessions and amenities. They’re also working to bring rideshare pickup closer to the terminal.
City officials say these projects will bring more jobs.
The expansion is estimated to cost $5 billion — none of which comes from taxpayer dollars. This comes from airport revenue, possible proceeds, and FAA grants.
“We’re seeing airlines really step up to ensure they are sharing in the infrastructure costs at no cost to Austin taxpayers, and so we’re very excited about that as well,” Council Member Vanessa Fuentes (District 2) said.
The Source: Information from interviews conducted by FOX 7 Austin’s Angela Shen
Lifestyle
After years of avoiding the ER, Noah Wyle feels ‘right at home’ in ‘The Pitt’
Wyle, who spent 11 seasons on ER, returns to the hospital in The Pitt. Now in Season 2, the HBO series has earned praise for its depiction of the medical field. Originally broadcast April 21, 2025.
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Television
After years of avoiding the ER, Noah Wyle feels ‘right at home’ in ‘The Pitt’
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