Classical music in general

[JimL]

I'm sorry guys and gals, but Yitzhak Perlman shared this on my Facebook, and I had to share it with the rest of you.  Comments welcome, but unnecessary:

It is what I think it is.

[Jimfin]

Excellent!

[semloh]

With "friends" like that, who needs enemies! 

[JimL]

Who needs a society?

[Peter1953]

Yes, it's funny. But... not far from reality.

Another thing is, not really on-topic, that I'm sometimes amazed how classical music lovers judge some composers. For instance, there is another forum and reading some comments on composers like Schumann and Tchaikovsky, I'm rather astonished how some members of that forum write about these composers. I read words like 'garbage'. And that surprises me very much. I can understand that some people don't like their music (anymore), maybe because it's overplayed or something. If it's overplayed, well, don't listen to it. Switch the radio off. Don't give the Tchaikovsky disc another spin. But garbage... unbelievable.  I'm glad we don't use similar words in our judgements and respect those composers, even if we don't like their music.

[Amphissa]

We don't like Tchaikovsky and Schumann? Dang, I guess I didn't get the memo. 

I've said, in different ways, many times, that the failure to move more in the direction of "What I think it is" and clinging tenaciously to the old "What it really is", marches us further and further along the same path we are following now.

The number of people who are willing to spend large sums of money on tickets, parking/transportation and other expenses to sit through 2 hours of "What it really is" shrinks by the year. (I'm referring only to the U.S. I think classical music may still be breathing in other countries.)

It's unfortunate that now we have "entertainers" like Andre Rieu and Celtic Women stepping into the void, redefining what is perceived as classical music for the populace at large, while orchestras and soloists cling with a death grip to 150 year old performance traditions.

I've given up trying to do anything about it. I've tried to inspire some creative thinking among the boards and music directors that I've worked with over the past two decades, to no avail. They sit in their board meetings and wring their hands over dying donors and shrinking audiences. Suggestions for infusing some energy and artistic production techniques into programs fall on deaf ears. Instead, they decide "let's do a Brahms cycle and get someone to sponsor the unheard-of 19 year old soloists who we can get cheap."

[jerfilm]

Yes, and isn't it sad that we cling to the old, tired things but yet we're more than happy to spend $40 or $50 million "remodeling" Orchestra Hall in Mpls??  (And I hope they don't screw up the perfect accoustics that we've enjoyed for what? 40 years?)   We Americans have a collective disease - we simply can't leave well enough alone.  A new Board comes along and they have to put THEIR stamp on it!  And what does this rant have to do with the topic?  If we don't jazz up the old place, folks are gonna continue to stay away....... as if that would somehow solve the problem.

Jerry

Well, they could use some new seats........but I expect I could arrange that for them for something less than 50 mil.....

[mbhaub]

I got a good chuckle from the picture -- it's all too true. This past Christmas my in-laws - devotees of Lawrence Welk -- saw something they just knew I'd love to have -- they saw it on Public Television so it had to be the best. My acting ability is getting better as I tried to show some delight for receiving a set of disks from Andre Rieu. There's another public perception that is the fault of movies and TV, at least in the US. Watch any primetime show and if there's mass murderer, psychopath, or intelligent criminal their music of choice is almost always classical, and often opera. The cool, hip people  -- never.  Such are the times we live in.

[JimL]

Re-gift!!!

And here we are, sitting on top of this mound, nay, veritable massif of unexplored, accessible repertoire that is ignored for the benefit of who?  Brahms?  Beethoven?  Wagner?  Bach?  They'll always be performed.  Contemporary composers?  Ditto.  The only place to venture into unknown territory and bring a sense of something old yet new in live concert performance is in the cornucopeia of unsung composers of the past, yet nobody even considers venturing there.  Why?  At the very worst, things won't change.

[mbhaub]

At the very worst, our already cash-strapped orchestras would close up shop because they couldn't sell enough tickets. In my experience, people stay away from unfamiliar repertoire in droves. We may know what they're missing, but they don't - and they have no intention of finding out. The vast, unexplored repertoire will be opened by the recording companies. Orchestras everywhere will continue slogging through Beethoven, Brahms, Tchaikovsky, and the gang, hoping to sell tickets. Of course, every now and then, some conductor takes a chance. Next season our local band is doing Liszt's Dante Symphony. We've never even had the Faust, and we're getting the even less known Dante. I'm looking forward to that one. But I bet the hall will be half-empty.

[Christopher]

Or maybe half-full...!

The Dante is way better anyway - as long as they leave out that awful minute-long loud-blast ending that Liszt wrote to please some princess who thought the original "quiet" ending of the Purgatorio wasn't "final" enough.... I have to programme my player not to play that bit!

[Dundonnell]

I have attended concerts in Perth(Scotland), Edinburgh, London, The Hague, Stockholm, Moscow and St. Petersburg.

What was certainly common, at least to the concerts in Perth, Edinburgh and The Hague, was that the average age of the audiences was at least 50. My distinct impression is that a substantial proportion of the audiences in the first two of these cities (and probably The Hague as well) attend because it is seen as part of a 'middle-class' society occasion. I would be rash to make any such assertions regarding audiences in the USA because I have not been to a concert in that country. The audience in Stockholm was a good deal younger...for whatever reason.
In a city with a music college or a university with a flourishing music department you will usually find a number of music students attending concerts.

This is a cause of very considerable concern for the future of live music, quite apart from the nature of programming discussed above.

The youngest audience and in many ways the most enthusiastic I have experienced was at an open-air concert given by the London Symphony Orchestra in Canada Square at Canary Wharf in London Docklands. The orchestra played music from films and tv shows. The audience sat on the grass and drank wine or beer which they had either brought themselves or bought from a stall in the square. If the kind of young person who can attend such a concert with enthusiasm can be attracted to a concert hall then things would indeed be looking up. At present, however, they seem deterred by what is regarded as a 'middle-aged' recreation.

[JimL]

Hand out free spliff to anybody who wants it as you exit the hall after the concert? 

[jerfilm]

Perhaps we're a bit too negative.  We do see quite a lot of younger folks at Orchestra Hall.   And i think that programming such as their Sommerfest series,  young people's concerts, etc.  start drawing younger folk into the fold.  And I'm not so sure that the current state of Pop music isn't helping us.  Younger folks looking for and discovering some "real" music.  My wife likes American Idol and so I "get" to watch it.  There's a tremendous amount of talent in this years group.  But they all SHOUT.   Even when they do '50s music.

Another thing that I think has been good, at least for Minnesota - they have a whole series they call Coffee concerts.   Start at 11 in the morning, out at one in time for a nice leisurely lunch downtown.  Yes, it's packed with WHITE hair.  It's perfect for them - they don't have to drive at night, especially in the dreadful winter months.  Or stay up past their bedtime.  And I think it helps keep the regular season series from looking so much like "old folks" stuff.....

If only more soloists could be persuaded to delve into the unsung repertoire........The Metropolitan Opera had it exactly right when they used to do their spring road trip.   They always sold out the Madame Butterflys and the Aidas and they always "starred" folks you'd never heard of - the newcomers, the up and coming young performers.  If you wanted to hear Pavarotti, well you just had to sit through an Adriana Lecouvreur or perhaps an Othello.  And they always sold them out, too.....

Of course, Pavarotti was famous for not showing up in Minneapolis, but that's another story...

jerry

[JimL]

At the very worst, our already cash-strapped orchestras would close up shop because they couldn't sell enough tickets. In my experience, people stay away from unfamiliar repertoire in droves.

Well, isn't the part of the problem that they're starting to stay away from the familiar repertoire in droves, too?