Author Archives: Neil Kurtzman
Naturalizing History – Book Review
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 15th July 2026Stephen Balch is a distinguished scholar and teacher. He has taught at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City and at Texas Tech University, where he was the director of the Institute for the Study of Western Civilization. He was also the founding president of the National Association of Scholars. He…
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LSO Concert Celebrating America’s 250th
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 12th July 2026A video of the second half of the Lubbock Symphony’s May 23, 2026 concert is below. The conductor is David Cho, the LSO’s music director.
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The AIs and I – We Answer the Same Question
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 11th July 2026I asked two AIs – ChatGPT and Gemini – the same question: In the pantheon of great Italian artists of all kinds, who are the four greatest? First, the answer I came up with and a brief reason for my choice. Here’s what ChatGPT said when asked the above question: (Notice the first person singular…
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Charles Craig – English tenor
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 7th July 2026Charles Craig was born in London on December 3, 1919, and died on January 23, 1997. He came from a large, unmusical family – he was the youngest of fifteen children. As a child, he was fond of the recordings of Enrico Caruso, though he didn’t consider a career as a singer. Craig worked in…
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July 4th and the Hazy Past
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 4th July 2026As the nation marks the 250th anniversary of its founding, I found myself musing on its 200th anniversary. My life has been long enough that I was a mature man when the bicentennial occurred. My wife and I were driving through the south of Germany on our way to Geneva with no schedule and no…
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Al Jolson
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 1st July 2026Al Jolson (1886-1950) was not merely the man who appeared in The Jazz Singer. He was one of the central figures in the creation of modern American popular entertainment. He was born Asa Yoelson in Lithuania, usually given as May 26, 1886, though the exact date is uncertain. His father, Moses Yoelson, was a rabbi…
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Why Socialism Has More Lives Than the Phoenix
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 26th June 2026Socialism, in its purest and most advanced form, is a political and economic system in which the means of production and the distribution of goods and services are owned, controlled, or directed by the government. In one form or another, it has been around for more than two centuries. It eventually disappears or degenerates into…
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Five Preludes
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 23rd June 2026The prelude to the beginning of an opera or to one of its acts differs from an overture in several ways. A prelude is usually, though not always, shorter. It is not a compendium of the work’s hit tunes. It tends to be less formal and more atmospheric. It typically runs directly into the action…
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Extinction Denied?
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 14th June 2026Two basic events seem to be converging. First, our technology advances at an astonishingly rapid pace, while our behavior hasn’t changed since our ancestors were kicked out of Eden. Thus, we now have the capacity for endless mayhem (I’m ignoring all the benefits of technology, as they can be extinguished in a millisecond), coupled with…
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Vaccinating Honeybees and Shrimp
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 12th June 2026The idea of vaccinating honeybees and shrimp would have sounded like science fiction only a few years ago. Both animals are invertebrates, lacking the sophisticated antibody-based immune systems that make vaccination possible in humans, dogs, cattle, and other vertebrates. Yet recent research has shown that even these seemingly simple creatures possess forms of immune memory…
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