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At least three more events will no longer take place at the Kennedy Center after its board, who was handpicked by US President Donald Trump, voted to rename the venue the Trump-Kennedy Center.
More cancellations in protest
New York dance company Doug Varone and Dancers announced that they will no longer stage their previously scheduled performance there in protest of the arts center’s renaming.
“It’s financially devastating. But morally exhilarating,” Varone told The New York Times in an email. (Varone did not immediately respond to a request for comment from ROLLING STONE.)
Also on Monday, the Kennedy Center’s website said two Cookers events scheduled for New Year’s Eve were also canceled. While the jazz band initially did not give a reason for the cancellation, it came after jazz musician Chuck Redd’s decision to cancel his annual free concert, originally scheduled for Christmas Eve.
More artists are withdrawing
Alabama folk singer Kristy Lee, who was scheduled to perform a free concert on Jan. 14, was also among the artists who canceled their performances. “I’m not going to lie to you. Canceling shows hurts,” she wrote in an Instagram post last week. “This is how I keep the lights on. But losing my integrity would cost me more than any paycheck. When American history is treated as if it can be banned, erased, renamed or remarketed to suit someone else’s ego, I cannot stand on this stage and sleep peacefully at night.”
In a statement to ROLLING STONE, Kennedy Center President Richard Grenell said: “The artists now canceling shows were booked by the previous far-left leadership. Their actions prove that the previous team cared more about booking far-left political activists than artists willing to perform for all people, regardless of their political beliefs. Boycotting the arts to show that you support the arts is a form of derangement syndrome.”
Legal threats and history
The new cancellations come several days after Grenell threatened to take legal action against Redd for canceling the Christmas Eve concert. He described his letter to the musician as “official notice” that the center would seek $1 million in damages for the “political stunt.”
For more than 20 years, the Kennedy Center has hosted the Christmas Eve Jazz Jam, with Redd headlining since 2006. “When I saw the name change on the Kennedy Center website and then hours later on the building, I decided to cancel our concert,” Redd told the AP on Dec. 24.
Ongoing protests against the Kennedy Center
The cancellations mark another wave of protests against the Kennedy Center after at least 26 performances were canceled earlier this year, including 15 by the scheduled acts themselves. The background was Trump’s self-appointment as chairman of the institution. Issa Rae canceled a show in February, citing “an infringement on the values of an institution that has always celebrated artists of all backgrounds and across all media.”