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It's Always Personal
Apr. 6th, 2012 07:21 amI was in a pretty good mood going in to Thursday. Go was out that morning, and there was a lot in it that I was happy with, including Craig Semon's review of the new Madonna album and, on the website, Nancy Sheehan's brief interview with local drag superstar Lady Sabrina:
I know I make a joke of it sometimes, that I'll be putting poets and drag queens in the newspaper until they make me stop, but I'm thrilled to work for a newspaper that agrees with me that we need to make an effort to present the range of arts & entertainment in the area, from the mainstream to the fringe, from the open mic to the symphony. It'll never be perfect, but I'm pleased with what we do.
Still, I didn't think Thursday would be that demanding, aside from having to kibitz on Scott Croteau's "American Idol" chat, it looked like it would be a normal day.
Then the news started breaking that Scott Ricciuti had died.
Working in Features, we don't really get a lot of breaking news, and if we do, it's easy: a band announces a big concert; a show gets canceled. You post it online and move on. Scott dying was real news. Which is fine. I've done real news. But the deal with real news is you can be a bit dispassionate with it. You have no idea who that person is in the car crash or the burning building. Not really. But when you work arts & entertainment, you're at least casually familiar with every major figure in the scene. You can maintain your objectivity in most things -- that's a work skill -- but news like this? Objectivity goes out the window. There is no way to pretend you don't give a damn. When a significant local artist dies, it's always personal.
I didn't know him that well, but Scott Ricciuti was an extremely talented musician, and a heck of a nice guy. He was one of those people who made this such an amazing place to be an artist and to be a journalist that covers arts. He's going to be missed.
I know I make a joke of it sometimes, that I'll be putting poets and drag queens in the newspaper until they make me stop, but I'm thrilled to work for a newspaper that agrees with me that we need to make an effort to present the range of arts & entertainment in the area, from the mainstream to the fringe, from the open mic to the symphony. It'll never be perfect, but I'm pleased with what we do.
Still, I didn't think Thursday would be that demanding, aside from having to kibitz on Scott Croteau's "American Idol" chat, it looked like it would be a normal day.
Then the news started breaking that Scott Ricciuti had died.
Working in Features, we don't really get a lot of breaking news, and if we do, it's easy: a band announces a big concert; a show gets canceled. You post it online and move on. Scott dying was real news. Which is fine. I've done real news. But the deal with real news is you can be a bit dispassionate with it. You have no idea who that person is in the car crash or the burning building. Not really. But when you work arts & entertainment, you're at least casually familiar with every major figure in the scene. You can maintain your objectivity in most things -- that's a work skill -- but news like this? Objectivity goes out the window. There is no way to pretend you don't give a damn. When a significant local artist dies, it's always personal.
I didn't know him that well, but Scott Ricciuti was an extremely talented musician, and a heck of a nice guy. He was one of those people who made this such an amazing place to be an artist and to be a journalist that covers arts. He's going to be missed.
