SAY CHEESE: Local photographer and actor Mark Oristano has taken headshots for hundreds of performers, so he knows what works and what doesn’t. But if there’s a cardinal rule for headshots, it’s this: “I tell my clients the same things. I tell them that my job is to make their headshot look as much like them as possible and from then on their job is to look as much like their headshot as possible.” He’s got plenty of other useful tips over at theaterjones.com.

A STELLAR DEBUT: All the buzz heading into Thursday night’s Dallas Symphony Orchestra concert surrounded the debut of a new viola concerto. But it was Meadows Symphony Music Director Paul Phillips‘ debut conducting the DSO that really excited Scott Cantrell. “Without a note on auto-pilot, Phillips lovingly paced, proportioned, balanced and shaped everything, from the Fourth symphonies of Beethoven and Schumann to a brand-new viola concerto by American composer Margaret Brouwer,” Cantrell writes in his dallasnews.com review.

UNDER CONSTRUCTION: The Amon Carter Museum’s building is undergoing some renovations in preparation for its 50th anniversary next year. In honor of all the construction going on around the building, the Amon Carter blog has posted some of Charles Rivers’ construction photos that are in the museum’s collection. The pictures documenting the construction of the Empire State and Chrysler buildings are especially timely now that this monster is complete.