Very good comment from Matthew Hodge on my Tabatha Coffey post. I’d talked about Coffey, the embodiment of tough love — just go to her site and read the powerful words you’ll see — who on a reality TV show impressively fixes failing hair salons.
What — I asked participants in a workshop I led — would Tabatha change if she came to an orchestra?
And I listed some of the responses I got. Things people had seen, that might revivify orchestras. Audience coming up to talk to the principal cellist during a break. Kids in a youth orchestra smiling while they played.
Comments Matthew:
It’s fascinating how all of the suggested Tabatha responses all involve the musicians getting more intimate with the audiences. (Talking from stage, saying hello in the intermission or even smiling.)
Remarkably simple to implement and all coming in at significantly cheaper than a laser light show and fireworks!
Which then got me thinking…
…of other musicians getting intimate with an audience. So I replied to his comment:
Another, similar idea — when Michael Christie first was music director in Phoenix, he stood outside the concert hall, greeting people in the audience as they came in.
And something I saw myself in St. Louis in the 1990s. At that time the St. Louis Symphony had an active community program. (They may again, but it lapsed earlier.) Before one of their concerts in Powell Hall, I saw audience members come up to the stage, to say hello to musicians they’d met at community events.
Or this: The St. Louis Symphony years ago played a Steve Reich piece, and when it was over, some of the musicians went out into the audience to talk about the music with anyone who wanted to do that.
Or this: Maxim Vengerov giving a solo recital in Carnegie Hall, on the big main stage. After the first piece, he turned to the audience and asked, “Any questions?”
From then on, the concert was a dialogue, with people in the audience shouting questions, even from the top balcony. I wasn’t there, but heard about it from my wife Anne Midgette, who reviewed the concert for the New York Times.
I’m sure we can all think of more examples.
More ways to make concerts interactive…
…to break down the invisible (but very tangible wall), to get musicians and audience talking together. And — a key to classical music’s future — to make performances really distinctive events.
(Now anticipating comments from those of the old school, who’ll say that I’m cheapening the music, that only the music matters, that in it lies all the communication we need. Thus blaming our audience for our failures, saying they’re just not educated enough. Or putting the blame on schools, which ought to jump to our commands, and teach every student to love the music we love.)
And today I just read this, from the seasoned consultant Tom Wolf, who in the newsletter his company WolfBrown sends out, talked about being barred from taking photos — even before a concert — in a concert hall he loved.
He writes:
Thinking about all of this later, I was reminded of a concert I attended a few years before at the Meyerson Symphony Center in Dallas when the immensely popular Russian baritone Dmitri Hvorostovsky appeared with the magnificent Moscow Chamber Orchestra. The audience was filled with ebullient Russians who, when the popular Hvorostovsky came on stage, whistled and cheered, and shouted bravo and took out their phones to snap photos. Ushers ran from person to person admonishing them to stop, but they refused to be denied. It was a happy crowd and the feeling was infectious. By the end of the concert, the audience was singing along when the baritone offered a popular Russian folk song that served as one of his many encores. I left the hall feeling completely upbeat.
Which then reminds me that after the premiere of one of the early Shostakovich string quartets, there was a party, at which the quartet was played again. This time the audience sang along with one of the themes.
And of course in earlier centuries the audience was anything but quiet. A subject for another post.
I am truly excited this is getting traction, and utterly saddened that this seems like such a new revelation to so many in the industry. There are innumerable stories of performers getting ‘intimate’ with audiences from the past three or four decades I have been performing on four continents, but mostly in the amateur/ community orchestra/ concert band/ theater scenes, even in Florida. It’s what we do second to sharing live music with others. I wonder why it’s a novelty among the Professional Orchestra Establishment?
Wonderful to read… These ideas have to be shown over and over in different settings. On all my tours, I invite the audience to take pictures and record and pretend that I haven’t read to the contract that forbids all of these things… I am so tired of all the classical music invisibility tropes in the guise of professional etiquette. Thank you always for keeping us brave
@Nadina – Love it! From the podium I often ask audiences to take their phones out but not turn them off. Instead, just put them on silent mode, and while they have their phones out, go ahead and take some photos! Sometimes I’ll give them a hashtag, and possibly even a funny pose, Always gets a laugh and a few folk taking and posting pictures.
Hi Stephen, you certainly CAN help execute classical’s much needed “Brand Hijack”!
As an insider already embracing change, you are what we’d call an “early adopter” in marketing speak… So it is your job to help shape others’ thoughts. And if we are to co-conspire, you’ll want to read the classic 2006 “playbook”.
Brand Hijack: Marketing Without Marketing (by Alex Wipperfurth – $10 on Amazon).
Modern branding is the most powerful and misunderstood of the “dark arts”… And no, I had nothing to do with the book, but I can vouch for it. Read up and I’ll think over how our web strategy might give insiders like you a direct role.
Thanks! Just ordered the book. I have always been a fan of marketing since teenage. My college options were either classical music, marketing, or computer programming. (Hmmm… Nah – still made the best choice.)
I’m buying the book!
Nothing like bringing everything to level of pop culture…..it’s so feel good baloney .
I agree , Ariel ! What if we made these same feel-good, as you aptly put it, demands of a Kabuki ensemble, or the great “Batsheva” dance company from Israel ? The Kabuki folks should be smiling ? Taking questions from the audience in the middle of their work ? A bluegrass group doing the next performance of Penderecki’s Threnody for The Victims of Hiroshima? Throw a litle Dixieland , what else, into the next Folklorico Mexico show ? Come on folks. I’m not trying to be sarcastic with anybody. This site seems to be a respectful place where people feel free to say their mind without reprisal . But I’m just carrying some of the “clap in between movements if you like” stuff to its logical extension. (And the increasing bashing of or sarcasm toward “traditional European” classical music and culture is truly disturbing. Even when it’s well-intentioned. It was less than 100 years ago that Civilization supposedly learned the folly and tragedy of labelling certain works as “Entarte kunst”, because of their origin ).
Jazzing up classical concerts is putting great-granny in a mini skirt. And you would be surprised at the number of young people who are really turned off by this stuff. You rarely see it abroad, or in Canada. It’s like taking a fine hand-crafted bourbon and pouring Mountain Dew all over it., or a splash of Pepsi over a vintage Krug cuvee. Americans are increasingly more sophisticated about food and wine and the same will happen in the fine arts if we stop trying to dumb the product down.
And , on the other hand I just wish presenters would quit boring the more sophisticated members of the classical audience with the same stuff ad nauseum. Has anybody in the past 25 years , other than the Jaarvi’s (i’m exaggerating; they’re not the only ones)- just an unusually innovative and prolific family of performers who have done so much for expanding our concert hall horizons) , dared to forego the usual perfunctory “Carmina Burana” for, say , Kodaly’s “Te deum’ or his “Psalmus Hungaricus” ? All three staples of the “European’ classical rep , same era, but the last two underperformed and the Orff piece maybe “safe” for yet another “gala” night in Podunkville but hey we’ve heard it so OFTEN !
Just one person’s opinion and I would welcome feedback, agree or disagree.
Granny BELONGS in a miniskirt… NOT a trenchcoat!
If classical music was always “granny”, then your premise would be fine… But if you could think in four-dimensions (zooming out from your timeline and into the time when Liszt left trails of fainting women all over Europe) you’d see that “granny” was an amazing, awesome, totally empowered nympho back in her day. Popular music wouldn’t exist now otherwise… And music has ALWAYS been, at least in part, a mating ritual.
But if we are going to sex her up after 100 years in the coffin, some fresh, wrinkle-free skin is appropriate. Go to a Muse concert (the great grandchild of granny’s ultra-obsessive love affair with German harmony and counterpoint). Go see Radiohead (the great grandchild of her more recent fling with French color).
And you think THAT’S “Mountain Dew”? Are you one of those “purer than thou” smarty pants who likes classical because it makes them feel superior to the pop culture they don’t understand?
Well, I can agree with you on ONE thing. Carmina Burana sucks!
Carmina Catulli is even worse! I’ve translated just about every poem of Catullus from the original Latin and I’m going on record now saying Orff was a ham-fisted ass of a composer who didn’t understand the rhythms of his source text. Orff’s entire reputation is based on the 30 good climactic seconds of Burana. What a huge waste of resources to assemble a massive choir for such a trashy piece. We could have an entire season of smart, sexy string quartets for that price!
Mike, just briefly…
We absolutely see these things happening abroad. Europe, the UK, Australia, wherever. Maybe not Asia, but in the western world for sure. In the UK it may well be bigger than it is here.
And as for taking things to their “logical conclusion,” what’s logical about it? You’re just imagining something, making up something, that has no connection with the reality of what’s going on. As if you don’t like what these people are doing, think they make no sense, and think that if they do XYZ that you don’t like, they’ll probably do all the rest of the alphabet. But the actual people involved have no interest in the things you’re imagining. Except in the sense that in various musical genres styles are very fluid, and are blending in surprising ways. But all that happens in a natural, organic way.
I’ve seen the same argument used by people who oppose gay marriage. They say, “Well, if we let two men marry, we can take that to its logical conclusion, and have people marrying horses.” Except that there’s a vibrant and passionate explosion of same-sex people getting married or wanting to, and nobody wanting to marry a horse.
You can oppose what we’re talking about, find it personally uncomfortable, or unneeded. But you might also understand that it grows organically from things people really want to do, and that it’s springing up spontaneously — and independently — in countless places. While the “logical conclusion” you imagine isn’t happening anywhere. So, if you think about it, it’s neither logical or a conclusion.
Maybe we should set aside the classical genre for the purists, treat the orchestra as just another instrument, the same way a guitar is an instrument that can play different genres like Flamenco, rock and country. Then we create a totally different genre with its own name that has nothing to do with “classical”. That would make the purists happy and allow orchestras and ensembles to reach a new audience without fear or restraint. Rebranding will be easier. No more fence sitting.
It’s so hard to change familiar terminology, though. If US orchestras want to make a project of rebranding themselves like this, let them do it. But for myself, i’ve long resisted trying to change the common names of things, even if proposed new names seem to make more sense. What holds me back is (1) the sheer effort involved, and (2) that it’s not likely I’ll succeed, so all the effort would be wasted.
Reasonable idea you have, though!
Liza is right (re-brand needed). Greg is right too (Sisyphus task?). Third Option: BRAND HIJACK!
Back in the day, I helped a dark arts client execute this strategy. It is the branding equivalent of a “hostile takeover”, where capitalists circle overhead waiting for a company to get so weak (cheap stock) that they can buy up say 10% and then… BAM!!! Trap springs shut as “hijackers” call out bad management and legally demand board seats (and a full vote).
This sort of “takeover” happens in branding too… The target brand needs to have long term value so it is worth hijacking, but also needs to be very weak due to OBVIOUS mismanagement. Sometimes companies even hijack their own brand (e.g. Dominoes calling out their “cardboard crust” pizza in a brilliant “self hijack”: http://pizzaturnaround.com/).
So how can WE learn from Dominoes and activist investors?
Simple… Study their methods and you’ll realize “classical” may be the best “brand hijack” candidate in history!
So rather than ditch the word “classical” entirely, why not hijack it?
Call out the mismanagement, and over time, change its meaning?
We could bring classical back to its REAL roots: targeting young people, getting louder whenever technology allows, always seeking fresh “skins” to drape over its old bones, always adopting the pop/dance rhythms of its day, and doing it all within a clear structure that may be condensed into notation by a composer/architect.
Isn’t that what “classical” has always been anyhow?
Rather than trying to educate people about sonata form, let’s teach them THAT!
Now, reality check… This will take time. My back in the day client’s “hijack” move involved burning a million dollars on a one day event, and despite selling out the 2,000+ hall, it barely moved the cultural needle. That client is a “move fast and break things” sort of company and underestimated the time it would take to reverse decades of cult brainwashing.
For that “brand hijack”, I infiltrated major conservatories and recruited a full orchestra of amazing young players, but we had several “Stockholm Syndrome” issues… Many players still BELIEVE the cult propaganda and are inflexible about practical things like rehearsal formats. We learned you must filter players ideologically, not just for chops.
In retrospect, I think classical just wasn’t weak enough yet. None of the “Big 5” had yet declared bankruptcy when we tried our million-dollar cash bonfire thinking we could instigate a “tipping point”. And today, the current patrons (and many players) will still resist another “brand hijack” because the reset would go against their cult training.
But historical accuracy is on OUR side.
Time is on OUR side too.
BOTTOM LINE: When enough purists have passed, “classical” dies… Or is hijacked and reborn.
Dear @Classytroll.
Thank you.
“So rather than ditch the word “classical” entirely, why not hijack it?
Call out the mismanagement, and over time, change its meaning?
We could bring classical back to its REAL roots: targeting young people, getting louder whenever technology allows, always seeking fresh “skins” to drape over its old bones, always adopting the pop/dance rhythms of its day, and doing it all within a clear structure that may be condensed into notation by a composer/architect.
Isn’t that what “classical” has always been anyhow?
Rather than trying to educate people about sonata form, let’s teach them THAT!”
I’m on board. How can I help?
Brilliant!
Before classical music was “classical” it was the popular music of it’s day. What makes audience interaction equivalent to “feel good baloney”? Stravinsky certainly wasn’t having buckets of “good vibes” tossed at him way after the premiere of “The Rite of Spring.”
Indeed, Greg. Take theater these days. You almost can’t go to a play, at least in Boston, without a “talk back” session with directors and actors afterwards. At the A.R.T. during the run of her most recent theater piece/project “Notes From The Field,” Anna Deveare Smith even had the audience break into discussion groups, led by trained people, discuss elements of the play and the issues (racism and incarceration) in it. There were varying degrees of success, but it was quite engaging.
“Tough love” might help consultants too… Talk is cheaper than lasers, but no easier to do right. So let’s be HONEST about our pool of potential “music ambassadors” (and what happens next if they manage to draw younger crowds).
First off, very few top tier players are good talkers. Seriously, how often do we lock a child in a room, pit their scales against a metronome in ever increasing tempi for a decade, and see an eloquent public speaker emerge? Our modern chops obsession is crazy… Makes it hard enough to develop MUSICALLY expressive players… But now we want eloquence, charm, charisma, public speaking, AND perfect scales at 200bpm? GET REAL!
Greg, as a former consultant who has worked with our cult’s “big names” (that’s how I funded my inner-city youth composition program), I know the trade requires “idea products” that seem doable, affordable, etc. You can’t scare clients or you won’t be hired back. So consultants recycle digestible maxims from pop-thought leaders like Malcolm Gladwell and deliver them “guru style”, in bite sized chunks. Pitching the “talk to the audience” idea has become a popular trope for a reason. It is cheap, it seems doable, and it offers hope (it might be rearranging the Titanic’s deck chairs, but even “classytroll” agrees hope matters). Baby steps are better than no steps. But if you are going to do it… DO IT RIGHT!
Here’s an example that is both GOOD and BAD: http://www.kennedy-center.org/Artist/A59681
First the good. Alexandra Osborne is the youngest member of the NSO’s violin section. Greg, no doubt you’ve noticed her effervescent personality bubbling through the boredom, right? Even at Curtis, she was special… Beyond incredible chops she had a rich butter tone that somehow extended to the nosebleed register effortlessly. It was clear she’d land a job (even though most don’t). Obviously the NSO realized she’s got charm and communication skills too. Her passionate advocacy for Beethoven’s Violin Concerto in this video is PERFECT. She tells us why SHE loves it. How it has moved her in different ways at different times in her life. She doesn’t lecture us, she just lets her love flow. So infectious!
Now the bad. How many Alexandras are hiding in our orchestras just waiting for us to pass the mic? Not many. This is harder than people think. And even when we “do it right” (and NSO is certainly a “best practices” model compared to other orchestras), we still look like idiots to the pros managing “touch point” campaigns for big brands. What does the NSO need? YOUNG audiences. What music do they love? Hip Hop. Did the NSO ask Alexandra about her work in this “forbidden” genre??? Of course not! I don’t blame her for not touting her street cred in her bio… It is toxic, apparently.
But I was in the west coast hip hop studio when she OWNED the crazy hard pizzicato section of a famous Paganini piece… Two prominent DJs were there too. One (a “playable character” in the DJ Hero video game franchise no less) summed up what we were ALL thinking: “Holy Sh*t… You just split my head open!!!”. These DJs had used various coalitions of willing strings before… But I hooked them up with Curtis kids for the first time. In a properly sized room, Alexandra’s acoustic fireworks DESTROYED this veteran DJ’s sense of the possible. Plugged in at the club the following night, she did the same for 2,000+ young fans. No talking required. Just amazing expressive shredding over a tight beat.
So in the NSO video, why isn’t a club packing local DJ sitting next to her, banging his head to her beat while she “kills it” shredding Beethoven? You recruit brand ambassadors from WITHIN the target demographics you want to reach. Modern viral marketing 101, folks! And the Beethoven Violin Concerto STARTS with a freakin’ kick drum solo, after all!
Now tough love part two… Even if your “musician talkers” succeed, and young people start to show, they won’t magically transform into acoustic only classical snobs. In fact, they will likely be COMPLETELY UNDERWHELMED. The sound will be anemic. Very little bass because our halls are way too big and we don’t amplify. The scene will be a far cry from the sexy pre-mating ritual that is a hip hop or electronic club show. Nobody will be grooving. No heads bobbing. No hot young bodies sweating. No chance of meeting someone and getting laid that night. Just a bunch of rich old people hacking and wheezing while throwing stern glances at each other for disturbing the “purity” of THEIR cultish experience.
So let’s get real folks. Yes, we need good talkers, and a few can be found within our orchestras, but our best ambassadors, the ones who can ALREADY reach the people we SAY we want, will be found outside our cult. And if we succeed in recruiting them and they manage to bring their peers, we’d better have lasers (or at least amps and some sort of lighting). And maybe that IS too expensive… Well, that’s what I’m here to fund… But is there even one orchestra brave enough?
P.S. Alexandra, sorry for exposing your hip hop chops without asking… Please don’t out “classytroll’s” identity though… I’ve received too many racist rants from “purists” over the years and don’t want their crap in my in-box. THANKS!
Amen to every word, classytroll.
What you’re urging on the NSO and Alexandra Osborne should be a natural at the K Center. Since they have a composer in residence who’s a dance DJ…since they started a hiphop initiative this year, featuring Q-Tip (though of course without a thought about what the local hiphop scene might be).
And then in DC there’s the Go-Go Symphony, which even without the violin chops you so vividly evoked, got the same reaction from local Go-Go stars. And is working with them, opening for Trouble Funk, for instance.
So to do what you’re talking about wouldn’t be the greatest surprise. But even so…even so…they just don’t. When they so easily could.
Who exactly is this “Classy Troll?” I like him/her.
Who is classytroll? The black ops brand of a secret society set to DESTROY classical’s cultish “traditions”. We do light side of the force projects too (funding the arts using our real names), but in the age of Trump, Sith Lord tactics are too powerful to ignore. Today, all must study Jedi force healing AND the evil emperor’s force lightening, right?
Some in our group have called me Greg’s “anger translator”… Greg is so damned fair… He takes everyone seriously and engages them seriously… Even the total idiot “let’s revive colonialism” racists! I think he believes they can be turned… He senses there is still good in them and all. He may be right, but we can’t muster the patience…
Maybe my tombstone will claim credit for classytroll’s work, but for now, dark arts branding demands anonymity.
I think we need both our ways, classyt. Good cop, bad cop. A classic team!
So Classy Troll, you strike me as someone who has succeeded in the traditional classical world and even seem to have the power to fund certain projects as part of the “light force”, as you say. At the same time, you seem to agree with Greg’s radical ideas. Does this mean the radicals are infiltrating the establishment? Is this a trend?
What is it like to be accepted as part of the “light force” while having the heart of the “dark force”? What do you see from the “light force” side of the aisle? Are you just waiting for the classical to weaken enough to do a brand hijack? (I just got the book, by the way).
I find this whole thing intriguing.
Me, too!
Great ideas! I definitely think it would enliven classical performances and go some way towards reducing the lack of intimacy inherent in large concert halls. I would also love to see people clap after first movements (assuming they don’t run on of course!). They are often the hardest (as a musician) and the most spectacular so why can’t we acknowledge that? Jazz audiences clap after solos, ditto ballet. In recent years I have started playing Scottish fiddle music, directing a large group and performing in a 6 piece group and we get very positive responses from chatting to the audience. It feels fantastic when they cheer and clap while you are playing!