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A holiday handgun promo?!? Because nothing says “I love you, Grandpa” quite like a couple of new clips. Seriously, people, seriously. I know we’re all supposed to be getting into the shopping mood early this year for the good of the tanking American economy and all, but this ad (thanks for ruining my breakfast, junk email!!) just makes a person ill.

I was feeling pretty dispirited, and then I got to thinking about an interview I did the other day with Robert Elmes, the director of Galapagos Art Space in New York. He offered the following:

If the arts can’t show leadership then who can? We can’t be simply bystanders in the midst of what others before us have built. As cultural leaders, we have a deep responsibility to lead not only on culture but on helping society evolve and adapt.

Wars, corruption, Palin, plummeting stock markets, soaring food, gas, and real estate prices, shoddy health insurance. I know a lot of people in the creative class who are feeling completely overwhelmed and trampled down by what’s going on in the world. Elmes’ words were pretty simple, and at first I thought he sounded pretty naive. Then I realized that I was the one being naive.

In the average America’s life, the arts are often pushed into a corner as an “extra”, a nice distraction on par with a beach vacation or a $40 bottle of wine. When it’s time for the serious issues, art is sent upstairs to play while the adults work it out. It’s got me thinking: So much of what Americans think is shaped by the strength of the marketing campaign and the collective image embraced by the participants. Do artists just need to project a different attitude? It sounds ridiculous, but how often do we sell our importance short and, in so doing, project that out to others? Remember that old psych experiment where a class is divided and half become “prisoners” and the rest become “guards”? It’s arbitrary, but people fall into the expectations of their assigned roles quite quickly. Have artists done the same? There’s so much on the line these days and people are looking for leaders. Isn’t it time to step to the front of the pack as a collective force and without apology? Start singing in some food courts for more than laughs. Sounds crazy, but then maybe truly crazy things will happen, resulting in minds opened to new perspectives rather than trapped inside ugly ones.

Mind the Gap has received it’s first question! I’ve offered my 2, now it’s your turn.

Dear Mind the Gap,

I really love new music, but a few things about it have me stumped. Non-profit groups like Bang on a Can, Alarm Will Sound, Anti-Social Music, and others celebrate an unprecedented musical diversity. All this suggests an “anything goes” culture–communities without boundaries, etc. My questions: How does an inclusive atmosphere affect the educational status claimed by groups in order to qualify as a not-for-profit? Should pop groups qualify as non-profit organizations, and be eligible for the grants that would accompany this? 

Signed,
Non-exclusive in Knoxville

***

Dear Non-Exclusive:

The borders have come tumbling down, you are quite right. Some patrons are quite shocked by what this has brought forth. (For instance, one of Counterstream Radio’s listeners wrote in to politely request that we not mix any more of that “jazz music” with the contemporary classical works on the playlist.) In my experience, redrawing the division lines has only been a force for creative and intellectual good. I can’t say if the federal government is keeping up with this trend, but I don’t expect that they are clinging tightly to any classical-only paradigm when their constituencies of “soccer moms” and “joe six-packs” so clearly have not. But that doesn’t mean the PTA is going to go in for taking their classes to bars to hear the local boy band.

In these crazy economic times, of course, everyone is looking closely at what it’s going to take to put food on the table, and not-for-profits do have a number of fund-raising and grant-acquiring perks available to them. However, the rules and regulations for getting 501(c)3 status is rendering the process increasingly difficult, and there are big questions you probably want to ask yourself and your group before attempting it. In addition, there are organizational requirements–the establishment of by-laws, a board of directors, and such–that most of the pop groups I know of would not be interested in pursuing. It’s just not usually part of the culture or the aspirations of the musicians involved in the scene. (Please correct me if I am off base!!) They want to play gigs and make records, not design education programs for the local elementary school.

That said, I don’t think “classical” music is the only genre in town with the ability to promote an educational mission. If that’s what you’re about, I don’t expect that what bin you’re filed in is going to be a stumbling block. But has that theory been tested? Anyone out there front a heavy metal band with a mission to teach math to 3rd graders? I mean, how educational is a symphony concert, anyway? Any 501(c)3 pop groups out there want to give it a test run?

Which, if you’re going to sit in a basement, is totally how I’d recommend going about it. (They’ve got enough gear down there for at least three more band members. I was hoping they’d let me stay.)

Matmos (a.k.a. M. C. Schmidt and Drew Daniel) invited me over to their house for a chat about music and, in 2.0 fashion, I brought along a camera and a production crew to document the occasion. We talked about why pop is like junk food, why iTunes is like porn, and why Björk is a star. We also covered how money could kill your music and how making music might make you want to kill the love of your life (and how to best avoid both).

You can watch the video and read the whole transcript here. Like wearing out a mix tape, I’ve read it four times, and I was there.

This year it seems like the creative class that brought you “Rock the Vote” has taken its “we just want people to participate” gloves off. Will.i.am might have been the first off the block, but now there are the rockers. And the jazzers. Hell, even the thereminists are getting in on the action. In new music land, composers got vocal. Emails went out from the likes of Meredith Monk, La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela in support of the “Women Against Sarah Palin” movement. John Adams sent private emails encouraging recipients to make a donation. Now, I know people don’t think “artist” and “Republican” in the same breath very often, but this time around it’s not just Bono up there in the public pulpit. Everyone seems to be falling in. As my favorite 8th-grade cheerleaders used to say, “Let’s get fired up!”

Okay, political pep talk over. You’d think I’d know better than to bring up such topics at dinner, but I don’t and I have and it’s ruined yet another pot roast. I promise we’ll get back to hard-core musical topics after this. For instance, Mind the Gap has received it’s first advice request! Get ready to correct me when I’m wrong.

UPDATE: But meanwhile, I mean, dear lord.

Aaah!

Aaaaah!

So very funny, so very (very) wrong.

Cern has fired up the giant particle collider and somehow a number of Googlers have landed here looking for evidence of impending doom. 

Dear kindly visitors: I cannot explain how you have been led so astray, but I can offer you directions to this playlist to help you along in your journey.

And speaking of the need for music in extremis, ever need to wrap your instrument in Saran Wrap just to get through the concert in one piece?

If you’ve ever descended the Carnegie Hall escalators and listened to a performance of, say, Morton Feldman’s music in Zankel, you know that you need a certain amount of open-earedness. The MTA will not be stopped, and whether you can deal with (and discount) a little sound bleed from the subway running on the other side of the wall or not largely determines how much you’ll enjoy your evening.

Well, fair music fans, the danger is about to get worse than a crowd of symphony subscribers in February. In all honesty, I initially though this writer was going to decry the terrible inspirational effect the construction noise around Juilliard was going to have on yet another generation of composers. In the end, however, it appears that Les is really only concerned with the decibel levels audiences will be expected to politely ignore. Wherever you stand on the issue, take comfort in the fact that we’re all just riding one huge pendulum of concert decorum. But putting aside the inter-movement consumptives for a moment, ambient concert noise: welcome sign of life in the hall or performance death knell? Is this really a danger? What’s the most ridiculous concert noise you’ve had to endure?

*Photo found on NYC subway musician Theo Eastwind’s MySpace page.

I am an advice column addict. What started with Ann Landers and Hints from Heloise when I was 12 has evolved into a steady diet of guidance from all sorts of sources–everything from Ask Prudence to Savage Love. I don’t usually have the kinds of problems that tend to plague the letter writers. Still, I read with devotion.

It’s a public service that is both entertaining and educational. Okay, sure, like staring at the ethical car crash that has introduced the nation to the Palin family, in large part it’s probably just that human love of knowing what sorts of salacious drama the neighbors are involved in. I’m not a church goer, but I often paused to ask myself, “What would The Ethicist do?” and I suspect it keeps me on an equivalent moral path.

I’ve been browsing season brochures and thinking about the relationship between presenters and audiences. Whether a newcomer to the scene or a giant institution of culture, a lot of energy is expended on trying to catch the eye of Mr. and Mrs. Public. But it’s a crowded room, and the target is elusive. I wonder what Dan Savage would advise if presented with this unhealthy relationship. Is culture trying too hard? Can the audience smell the desperation on the postcards? Or is culture in America playing too hard to get?

Self-criticism is difficult; it’s why we need advice columnists to pull up the window shades for us sometimes. Who would throw over an amazing piece of art for another episode of Law & Order? Oh, Law & Order flirted with you, made you feel pretty and smart, but Art began the evening by presenting you with a seating chart and the check? I can see how that would be a turn off. Ahem, let’s try again. Oh, you know Elizabeth? Small world. Let me get you a drink.

If you have a cultural question you don’t think you can Ask Amy, feel free to drop a line.

I’ve been overwhelmed by the guilt that the stack of unopened CDs on my desk perpetually induces, and so I’ve devoted several hours a day this week to spinning discs and reading liner notes. The music has run the gamut from amazing to dull, as have the accompanying texts. Like cleaning out your inbox, however, I’m down to just two or three discs still in their shrink wrap, and I feel much, much better.

In my own recreational listening, I tend to spend little or no time perusing those little booklets, and I’ve pretty much sworn off writing for them. The first time I tried my hand at it was for a CD of solo violin work performed by Curtis Macomber. It should have been easy–I’m a violinist, I’m a writer–but instead I suffered a minor panic attack the night it was due, mumbling to my roommate, “What do I say? What do I need to tell anyone about this music? They don’t need me. They’re probably already listening to it! Who needs me blabbing about history and making up descriptions when the music is already filling their head?”

I was thinking about this again today while assembling Ikea furniture, aided by those clever/poetic/maddening (depending on your talents) pictogram instructions. In the international language of line drawing, they try and make the process of transforming a box of boards into functional furniture a little less daunting, offering a suggested route and posting signage where the wrong turns are. They give you an idea, and a piece of your brain has to take that information and translate it into a small set of tasks to complete. I wish I could write about music in a similar way, leaving more room for reader reaction to fill the space so that they are helped along by what I’m saying, yet the experience and the end product are uniquely theirs. I want them to walk away and think: a million people may brush their teeth over a Vättern sink cabinet tonight, but I put this one here together myself.