STANDING O’S: The Dallas-Fort Worth Theater Critics Forum held its annual confab recently to name its award winners. The Forum does things a little differently – rather than pick one winner in each category, they prefer to cite several performances that they deem worthy of recognition. Special props to Art&Seek guest bloggers Lee Trull (The Pillowman) and Michael Federico (Jihad Jones and the Kalashnikov Babes) for being named in the Outstanding Performance by an Actor category. You can read the entire winners list on theaterjones.com. Alexandra Bonifield writes about her first time voting for the awards here.

MIND THE GAP: Thirty seven years is a long time to go between albums. And Willis Alan Ramsey probably wouldn’t be recording his second album now if his self-titled first wasn’t hailed as such a classic. So what took so long? The Highland Park High School graduate tells dallasnews.com that perfecting that first album left him drained. But he says the goal is to release its followup by the end of the year.

WHY ALL THE SECRECY? A day after the big announcement concerning the DCPA’s new name, questions have begun to arise as to just how much AT&T is kicking in for the rights. Judith Dobrzynski, who writes the Real Clear Arts blog, says she understands the need for corporate sponsorship. But she’s curious about just how much sponsorship is being given. “How are people going to judge whether this is a fair deal or whether AT&T bargained too hard? And how are AT&T shareholders going to know whether they’re getting their money’s worth,” she writes. “Eventually, the numbers usually out. Why hide in the meantime? It looks suspicious.” She’s right on the last part – most likely the numbers will eventually emerge. We’ll just have to wait until then to draw our conclusions.