BBC Radio 3: World of Classical

This Sunday will see the premiere broadcast of the three-part BBC Radio 3 feature, World of Classical, that I've been working on over the past year. Each episode focuses on some core themes (e.g. Music Notation) in Global music histories and makes connections between different music traditions and how those themes were approached or used. …

on singing while playing the cello (part 6: singing in multiple styles)

At one of the last Sulh Ensemble rehearsals before the social distancing we read through some Balkan tunes that I used to play in other groups. I had forgotten how wonderful some of those tunes are, and at the same time had forgotten some of the pronunciation of Bulgarian, Macedonian, and Serbian. While listening to …

Death of the Pop Music Industry and the decline of Popular Culture

John Loken, a former record label marketing exec posted an intriguing blog last February (2011) titled "The Death of Pop Music?" where he talks about the decline of, well, Pop Music.  In particular, the industry "defined as the commercialization of short form songwriting, a historic aberration that lasted for the better part of the 20th …

How audiences can’t save the arts, or sports, or pop music, or…

Since the 60s live audiences haven't really sustained much of anything.  The economic infrastructure that creates 'sustainability' for Classical Music, the Sports Industry, and the Pop Music Industry since the post WWII economic boom in the US has had much more to do with the growth of all three of these fields. Foundations and donors …

The Pop Music Industry and the Cost Disease

"[C]ost disease studies usually select opera, theater, and the symphony orchestra. Cost disease proponents display an unjustified bias towards 'high culture.' We also should consider today's cultural winners, such as rock and roll, country music, and heavy metal." (Cowen, 1996) "In 1983 it took General Motors about 135 man hours to produce a car.  Twenty-five …

An alternative view of Orchestral Musician Compensation according to Flanagan

So we're often told that orchestras run deficits.  Sure, ok--but how often do we hear that orchestras in countries with a higher level of subsidies actually run bigger performance deficits?  Here's what Flanagan says: Symphony orchestra bankruptcies, an unwelcome feature of the U.S. classical music scene, are essentially unheard of abroad, although foreign orchestras are …

What if there’s really no “decline” in Classical Music audiences?

So a few weeks ago I was playing around with numbers, namely I was playing around with the numbers given by various surveys regarding arts participation as well as population.  Keep in mind that data are simply the raw numbers you work with while statistics (or statistical methods) is (are) the interpretation of the raw …

Flanagan and Changing Tastes for Classical Music

In Chapter Five, "The Search for Symphony Audiences," of Robert Flanagan's book, The Perilous Life of Symphony Orchestras, the author discusses several reasons for audience decline (as well as the statistics demonstrating this decline).  He does note, since this is what the NEA data tells us, that decline has happened for virtually all types of …

Looking good can make you play worse…

Bryan Townsend, in a post about Uzbek pianist Lola Astanova, made some comments about a review of the pianist by Zachary Woolfe in the NYT.  I'm going to quote an extended excerpt of the piece as it relates to some interesting studies about how visual stimuli can affect how we hear things (ironically, the studies …

Asian Invasion of Classical Music

So Greg Sandow wrote a post on diversity in classical music and somehow it just left me feeling a little bit betrayed.  Not that what he's saying is necessarily wrong, but it's the typical issue that many of us Asians/Asian-American have with regards to any idea of diversity.  Historically, ethnic diversity talk in the US …

Arts Funding Is Supporting A Wealthy, White Audience: Report

This is the title of a recent Huffington Post piece that discusses a study by the Washington-based National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy.  Given the demographic trends I've been blogging about, this is, as Drew McManus says, obvious.  What is also obvious is that the 'Chicken Little Think-Tank' (as Drew often refers to classical music reformists) …

on Klingon weddings and playing the Sci-Fi/Fantasy circuit

So, as I mentioned in the previous post, there is an embarrassment of riches as far as performing options are concerned, if you're willing to think outside the box.  The past few years I've been playing the Sci-Fi/Fantasy circuit.  I hesitate to call it the "Sci-Fi/Fantasy Convention circuit" if only because some of the best …

Classical vs. Pop [vs. the Rest]

There's a phrase in post-colonial criticism and politics that essentially states that the overriding dichotomy is the "West vs.the Rest."  One of the things that strikes me about discussions (in the US and in Europe to some extent) about the decline of Classical Music (and by "Classical Music" I'm obviously meaning the Western or European …

The death of the cinematic industry…

So the last movie I went to, Thor, I was intrigued to see a table with fliers for a couple of upcoming "special events." The two fliers were slick promos for upcoming (one now past) live HD cast performances by the Metropolitan Opera and the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Look at that blurb in the top …

Classical Music Across Cultures

I just got a twitter subscription from Classical Music Across Cultures.  I'm interested in seeing what this is about.  The website will go live in a few hours so we'll get to see more of what this is all about though judging from their facebook page is more of an outreach program for Classical Music …

Changing US Demographics and Classical Music

Re-posting Ramon Ricker's blog about Changing US Demographics and Classical Music in full, just because it can never be said enough! Posted on November 9, 2009 at 5:00 am by Ramon Ricker in General Tags: concerts, opinion, orchestras Here’s a personal observation and some thoughts. When my wife and I visited the Netherlands a couple …

Too Many Notes, too few orchestras

While reading the comments to a post by Drew McManus that I mentioned in my previous post, I came across a reference to a post that drew had written about the issue of having too many groups offering the same thing in a metropolitan area. While Drew disagrees than in general there may be too …

Too many (classical) musicians?

Eric wrote a probing and insightful post questioning the often mentioned mantra (by the Classical Music doomsayers camp) that there are just far too many musicians being pumped out by the University system (at least in the states) to be sustained by the shrinking classical music job market.  I know that in the past I've …