Too many people in classical music talk like this. I'm thinking of Daniel Barenboim, quoted about his latest recording of Beethoven's symphonies, a project he and his people call "Beethoven for All": Many people feel or think, without really knowing, that music is somehow elitist – that it is for people who can afford the money and the time; it’s something that has only to do with leisure. But music is not elitist. On the contrary. Music is not only not elitist, music is universal. Even though all the great composers of the past are … [Read more...]
About my four keys — the culture gap
Here's the start of Jon Pareles's review of Bob Dylan's terrific new album, from the New York Times: Bob Dylan’s voice isn’t getting any prettier. At 71, on his 35th studio album, “Tempest” — and a full 50 years after he released his debut album in 1962 — Mr. Dylan sings in a wheezy rasp that proudly scrapes up against its own flaws. That voice can be almost avuncular, the wry cackle of a codger who still has an eye for the ladies. But it can also be calmly implacable or utterly bleak, and it’s completely believable when Mr. Dylan sings, in … [Read more...]
Helping you
I'm happy — thrilled — with how much people like my four keys to the future. Aka the four things we in classical music must do, if we want to build a new audience, and help classical music survive. And of course (as commenters have eagerly noted) there's lots more to say about how we do these four things. I'll be saying much of it in weeks to come. The first two points, especially, can be expanded. The first one — understand and respect the culture outside classical music. — is harder than it seems. One problem for the classical music … [Read more...]
What we have to do
Now it's time to return to the main business of this blog, which of course is the future of classical music. And also to return to something I stressed before my vacation, which is that the main business — the highest priority, the central focus — of people in our field should be to find a new audience. This ought to be a no-brainer. As things are now, the old audience isn't being replaced, or at least not in anywhere near large enough numbers to sustain classical music institutions at the size they are now. Or to give smaller groups and … [Read more...]
100 Cage
Years ago, a dear friend, a violist, gave two solo recitals, with the same program. One of the pieces was John Cage's Variations IV, in which the score is nothing but a sheet of plastic with some black dots on it. You're asked to draw a map of your performing space, overlay the plastic on it, and everywhere a dot falls, do something. [As we'll see, I didn't remember this correctly! I'm largely right, but got some details wrong.] Which makes this one of those Cage pieces -- the famous silent piece is the best known -- that many people still … [Read more...]
Return
I'm happy to be back from vacation, though I'll confess that I'm a little whiplashed by weather. Forget jet lag (I was in England). What really hit me, returning to my two US homes, was moving from wet fall weather in the UK, into humid hot summer -- with cicadas wheezing in the trees -- in Washington. And then into what feels like very early fall in Warwick, NY, with the air warm in the day and cool by night, and the leaves already turning, lying red on the ground. We were in England for three weeks, and our little Rafa, now 10 1/2 … [Read more...]
Visiting the cows and sheep
I'm on vacation, till September. Gone off to the gloriously lovely spot we go to nearly every summer, in Britain's Yorkshire Dales. Staying in a 17th century house that might be visited by cows, if they escape from a farmer's field. And then peer through the French doors of our dining room! (Cows are easy to chase away. They're timid. Sheep -- which also escape, and visit us -- are much more stubborn.) So I won't be blogging again till after Labor Day. I'll approve comments for a week, perhaps, and then look at them very lazily, if at … [Read more...]
Playing more vividly — second post
[Continuing my thoughts about why we should play more vividly, if we want a new audience.] Here's an exercise. Look at the score of a Haydn or Mozart symphony. You'll see contrasts between piano and forte, between soft music and loud, occurring throughout, clearly marked by the composers. Who -- very clearly -- wanted parts of the music to be loud, and other parts to be soft. And, evidently, relished the contrast. So now listen to performances, live or recorded, and ask yourself if you're hearing the contrasts the composers clearly liked … [Read more...]
Playing more vividly, for the new audience
At last I've gotten to the last part of my long disquisition -- which was longer than I meant it to be, and maybe longer than it should have been. Loyal readers will remember I said that the highest priority for the classical music world should be to build a new audience, and that this would require doing three things: making performances feel more lively, playing repertoire that reflects contemporary life, and -- finally -- playing all music, but especially the old masterworks, more vividly. That last point bothered some people, including … [Read more...]
Repertoire — final post
Some years ago, I hosted and coprogrammed a concert series for the famous new audience, with the Pittsburgh Symphony. We did many things -- play the first movement of Mozart's Paris Symphony, with the audience told to applaud whenever it heard a passage it liked. (Because that was the practice in Mozart's time, as he explains with great delight in a letter to his father. He was delighted because he'd gamed the audience, written music that guaranteed they'd applaud.) (And -- digression, but an important one -- the result was revelatory. The … [Read more...]
New programming — expanding the box
One more thought about changing/expanding the classical repertoire, because our culture has changed, and people have new ideas about music. Have had those ideas, in fact, for quite a while. So I want to suggest that classical music people -- even those in the most mainstream classical music institutions -- should perform music that's far outside the normal notions of classical music. This is music that might be compared to installation and performance art, work which (as I've noted before) is huge in the art world, is shown in major … [Read more...]
Programming for a new audience — things that worked
So why does Lincoln Center's White Light festival matter? I mentioned it in my last new audience post, and listed next season's programs: U.S. premiere of Rian, performed by Ireland’s Fabulous Beast Dance Theatre Virtuoso Wang Li plays jaw harps and calabash flute N.Y. premiere of choreographer Akram Khan’s Vertical Road Cameron Carpenter plays Bach on the Alice Tully Hall organ Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde, arranged for chamber orchestra, conducted by Matthias Pintscher, and performed by pianist Emanuel Ax, members of the New York … [Read more...]
My newsletter — plus a photo of Rafa
(A digression from the posts I've been doing.] Last week, I sent out a summer issue of my newsletter -- and I've realized, with a shock, how little I talk about my newsletter here. [Pause while Greg communes with himself about how he might improve his way of doing business.] You can read my latest newsletter here. And if you'd like to subscribe and get it by email, here's where you do that. What's in the newsletter? A terrific photo of my little son, nine months old. (And crawling at light-speed, though that's not in the photo.) A … [Read more...]
Programming for a new audience — more examples
As I wrote in my last post (at greater length): I'm not saying that every moment in every classical performance has to be new and eclectic. I'd expect a wide-ranging mix. All-Schubert one night, Les Noces the next weekend, Shuffle.Play.Listen midweek, and then a student-crafted concert happening down the street. Then a Stockhausen retrospective, and then my friend Stewart Goodyear playing his Beethoven marathon, all the sonatas in a single day. That said, here are more examples of what can be done. Of what has been done. I label some of my … [Read more...]
Programming for a new audience — Shuffle.Play.Listen
Shuffle.Play.Listen -- that's the title of a Matt Haimovitz/Christopher O'Riley double CD, which I should have blogged about ages ago, especially after I heard Chris and Matt play a version of it live. Among much else, it revolutionizes the cello/piano repertoire. (Here's a Spotify link if you want to hear it.) When I heard it live (at George Mason University in Virginia), the pieces were announced as (or after) they were played, rather than being listed in order in the program. So I had no idea what the first piece was. Clearly 20th … [Read more...]