Singer Who Quit Kennedy Center Says He Feared ‘Retribution’
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Singer-songwriter Ben Folds, the former artistic adviser to the National Symphony Orchestra, spoke out against Trump’s takeover of the Kennedy Center, where the Symphony is housed, citing a “new partisan toxic environment” that politicizes any affiliated artists.
“These days, if an artist agrees to perform at the Kennedy Center, they risk being seen as explicitly endorsing the Trump administration and all of its policies,” Folds https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/politics-news/ben-folds-on-trump-kennedy-center-takeover-1236653505/" rel="" target="_self" title="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/politics-news/ben-folds-on-trump-kennedy-center-takeover-1236653505/">said at a public congressional forum on the Trump Administration’s cuts to arts funding on Tuesday. “Declining an invitation to perform at the Kennedy Center will have an equal and opposite political effect.”
https://www.thedailybeast.com/obsessed/ben-folds-says-kennedy-center-politics-left-him-no-choice-but-to-resign/">Read more at The Daily Beast.