TomTom: The Smart Choice in Personal Navigation

(Via You’ve Cott Mail)

Anthony Tommasini, chief classical music critic for The New York Times, is answering your questions until Friday the 13th! E mail him at askthetimes@nytimes.com. There’s a nice healthy bio before the Q&A; it would be great to have bios for all the critics in the arts section, I think, so readers (and publicists) can learn where the journalists are coming from in their reviews/features without having to comb through Wikipedia like I do obsessively.

This bit from his bio is interesting in light of the earlier discussion we had here:

He started out his professional life teaching music at the college
level and performing as a pianist, including lots of chamber music and
vocal accompanying. “As a critic, I still think of myself as a kind of
teacher,” Mr. Tommasini said. “And, having been a performer, I know how
hard it is, which makes me, I hope, a more sensitive critic. I’ve been
there.

Perhaps I’ll e mail in and ask my question: do journalists expect artists to read their reviews and then learn from their criticism?

The unwashed masses have put forth three great marketing/PR queries so far: the first, from Ryan Tracy, is why treat classical music so sensitively in reviews, and the second, from Cyrus E. Pace, is who is responsible for educating folks about classical music. The third is why do critics only review the first performance, from Marilyn Kane.

Why
treat classical music sensitively? And why use an affinity of
experience to sensitively shade criticism of current practitioners?
Couldn’t this open up critics to apology and punch-pulling when artists
aren’t quite up to snuff?

[Excerpt, entire answer can be found here.]

Now, in no way do I want to suggest that a critic should be an enabling voice for a musician
who isn’t quite “up to snuff,” as you put it. But the general level of
music-making in America is very high. The training at conservatories
and universities has never been better. Obviously, the truly great
performers are rare and miraculous. But it’s amazing to me how seldom I hear performances of really sub-par quality.

Yet, there is a larger issue here, as I see it. I do think
that there has been too much emphasis in classical music on performance
over content. In earlier centuries it was composers who towered over
the field. Starting in the 20th century, though, virtuoso performers,
especially superstar conductors, seemed to claim most of the attention
and the power. I am as thrilled by a great violinist or a remarkable
soprano as anyone else. Still, I think that balance has been lost and
we must devote more attention to music itself. One of my mantras in
writing about that challenge facing major orchestras is that American
orchestras should think a little less about how they play and a little
more about what they play and why they play it. The whole notion of the
“Big Five” American orchestras has been questioned in recent decades,
and that’s fine by me. When I see a conductor who has galvanized an
orchestra and its home city, like Esa-Pekka Salonen and the Los Angeles Philharmonic,
I want to cheer, because the priorities seem so right. Salonen’s
programs are diverse and exciting, with lots of new and recent music.
Audiences are energized. I think the musicians and music-lovers in Los
Angeles are having far too much fun to care a bit about whether their
orchestra, on a technical level, makes the cut of the top five, the top 10 or whatever.

I love that the Times is doing this, and that readers are asking questions about serious industry issues. I realize it’s incredibly time-consuming, but it would be fantastic to have a different Times classical (rock, fine art, dance…) critic answer a reader question every week in Arts + Leisure. That way, both the critics and the art forms would become – or at least be perceived as – more accessible. Should it happen, here’s mine for Roberta Smith: In reviewing a museum exhibition, is it the art critic’s responsibility to review the actual works of art, to review a curator’s work in designing an exhibition within a space, or to review the museum/gallery space itself?