In defense of relevance

I've said it many times and I'll say it again (I'm sure Sam has grown weary of this) - one of my favorite catchphrases - "If you don't like change, you'll like irrelevance even less."

I was thinking about the whole notion of relevance over the weekend, particularly of the naysayers who claim that "classical"/concert music (can't we come up with a better term for it??) has no place in contemporary culture. How is it possibly relevant to the 21st century? Who listens to an orchestra?

My riposte: Are you kidding me? Are you watching the Olympics?

First of all, did you notice the group of musicians that participated throughout the opening ceremonies? Uh-huh. Not a rock band; members of the Vancouver Symphony (although there was the requisite kerfluffle over live vs. Memorex).

And speaking of the opening ceremonies, yes, of course we had Sarah McLachlan and k.d. lang, but we also had Canadian opera singer Measha Brueggergosman, singing the all-important Olympic hymn.

Now, the medal ceremonies. National anthems; empty fauxchestra MIDI recordings? No way. All recorded by a very much real Vancouver Symphony:



And it goes beyond the Games themselves. I'm always fascinated by music choices for TV ads, and two GE ads stood out to me immediately. This one clearly banks on the universality of Beethoven:



And another ad by GE, this one using the slow movement of the Ravel Piano Concerto. Call me a sucker for sentimentalism, but it pulls at my heartstrings every time I've seen it (nearly a dozen viewings at this point). And it's very much the choice of music that creates the poignancy of this ad:



And of course, we can't discuss classical music in popular culture without talking about figure skating - here's a link to what I thought was the better of the two Scheherazade compilations heard in pairs finals. The orchestral music/figure skating pairing is very logical; symphonic music provides the kind of variety of moods, shifting colors, grandeur and drama that make a great skating program. Sure, sometimes you get slightly odd mishmashes of selections, but the fact remains that it still exposes a broader audience (who isn't glued to the Olympics right now?) to concert music. I think it's a good thing.

Of course, then you get the purists who make snide remarks about how dumbed-down the music is - here's a bit of barely-contained snarkiness about how ignorant skaters are about the classical music often used for their programs. Which I think is misdirected, in a way, because I don't think they're concerned about "musical integrity" in the way one would be if one were, say, presenting a concert of the same music just as music, without the spectacle of the skating which is, after all, the main focus in a skating competition. So what if they chop up musical selections or go from Mendelssohn to Chopin? And who's to say what's "tacky" in this context?

This kind of commentary/critique bothers me because it does everything to confirm the perceived snobbery and elitism of those of us in the classical biz (critics and bloggers included). I don't expect a seamless, logical, historically informed performance of symphonic music in a skating program any more that I expect the average orchestral musician to know about a triple Lutz or the byzantine judging system. But I'm happy that music and skating intersect, that a larger audience hears and appreciates it, and that a few might even be interested enough to look up Scheherazade, or whatever. It's all about exposure, keeping in the public eye and ear, participating in contemporary culture. Because the world is an ever-progressing, ever-changing place. And who likes irrelevance?

Insta-hit

So, to keep up with the levity here lately, have all of you been following the whole "Pants on the ground" phenomenon?

If not, in a nutshell; last week on American Idol, contestant Larry Platt busted out with this incongruously catchy ditty:



Note that Simon says, "I have a horrible feeling that song could be a hit". Prescient words...

Of course, it went viral. Everyone's talking/writing about it; YouTube is filled with remixes.

A sure sign that you've gone totally mainstream? You're being covered by...Brett Favre:



Further proof that you've become a cultural phenomenon; being covered in the style of someone else (in this case, by Jimmy Fallon as Neil Young - one of the most dead-on impressions I have ever, ever heard):



On one level, this kind of thing simply feeds into our (collectively) short attention span, and it's certainly a fantastic distraction (hey, focusing on the latest YouTube hit sure does keep our mind off of real news).

But in a larger sense, maybe it's just the simple human desire to have something to discuss around the water cooler, to have something we can have a laugh over and gather around together.

My question is, how does this happen? How do people/events/tunes/videos/whatever capture public attention? What makes something go viral?

Tweet tweet

Yet another article/blog about arts organizations and their forays into online social media, this one focusing on Twitter.

While in a broad sense I agree with author Anne Midgette's assertion that "the classical music field’s attempts to be hip and draw in a younger audience are a little embarrassing, or stilted", she lost me at "I’m not sure just how many core classical fans use Twitter". I thought the whole purpose of arts organizations using these types of media was to reach people who would NOT consider themselves core classical fans?

As an outreach vehicle, it makes sense to tweet. But the problem is, many organizations assume that simply disseminating information in a tech-savvy way (and to a different demographic) will lead directly to the holy grail, bringing in "the young people"/increased ticket sales.

That erroneous assumption is apparent in the way many arts organizations tweet - "Enjoy the sounds of Mozart & Mahler 2nite @xyzsymphony". This is not going to garner you any new patrons, I assure you. Because the purpose of many of these online social engines is not "We're cool too, buy tickets!". It's more about fostering connections and developing relationships without the expectation of a tangible outcome or goal.

I tweet regularly (a couple of times a day, usually) and follow about 100 individuals/organizations, from Artsbeat (news and views from New York Times critics and arts reporters) and Tim Lefebvre (frequent bassist of Chris Botti's band) to Serious Eats (for my foodie side) and UniformProject (because I love fashion and this is just a fascinating idea, for a good cause).

I follow several dozen conductors/composers/soloists as well, and those who I most look forward to hearing from provide not information about their upcoming album release, but musings about life on the road or the fantastic wine they had yesterday or finding time to practice while their children are napping. Ironically, having a 140-character insight into people on an everyday basis (often about mundane things - "Today's lemon curd came out REALLY well") makes me feel connected to them. And when you feel privy to someone's inner thoughts, and you find those thoughts interesting/funny/thought-provoking, you might be more inclined to check out their show when they swing through town.

When it boils down to it, I look forward to logging into Twitter at the end of the day to check out what the motley assortment of people I follow have been up to/thinking/trying to do that day, and there is definitely a sense of self-created community there. Because in the end, that's the whole purpose of online social sites - supporting an exchange of ideas and fostering a sense of connectedness.

So why should arts organizations be a part of this? First, because lots of people spend their time hanging out online, and it's dangerous to not be a part of the larger conversation - and non-participation just feeds into the notion that classical music/classical art is stodgy and behind the times. Second, and more importantly, because it's simply very, very important to share ideas and forge relationships. Not just on a basic humanity level (not that I'm knocking that...), but also because when you have warm, fuzzy feelings towards someone/something, you're more likely to have a high opinion of them, feel like you relate on a personal level with them, support them in an emergency, speak well of them in public, and contribute to a positive buzz.

Positive image, accessibility, personal connection. The possibility of all this fantastic self-generated PR on a free platform. What's not to love?

Opera, popera

A Green Day musical? Seems about as logical as, say, an opera about Anna Nicole Smith.

Oh, wait...

When In Doubt, Shoot The Rich

There's nothing like a great big mess of fuzzy populist logic to get my blood boiling on a Monday morning, and thanks to outgoing St. Paul Pioneer Press arts critic extraordinaire, Dominic Papatola, I've just been reading an 1800-word rant of cosmically fuzzy and populist proportions by none other than rock star David Byrne, who maintains an impressively extensive blog on his website.

It's always dangerous to try and summarize an argument that you vehemently disagree with, but since I'm assuming that most of you aren't actually going to go and read the whole blasted thing, I'll do my best to be fair up front. Basically Byrne has noted from local LA news reports that the LA Opera is currently in severe fiscal distress, and is seeking (and has since received) some $14 million from the city/county government to keep it from collapsing before the end of the current season. Byrne has also noted that the very same LA Opera is undertaking a truly massive (even by Hollywood standards) production of Wagner's Ring cycle, at an estimated cost of $32 million. "What makes this situation notable is not the amount of money," says Byrne, "but the fact that the audience will be so small, and that the state is footing part of the bill."

Leaving aside the question of how we're defining "small," Byrne's obviously got a point here. It's wildly awkward, to say the least, to be asking for a massive government bailout at the same time that you're continuing work on the operatic equivalent of Avatar.

Of course, bailing on a project as big as the Ring when you've already committed significant resources to it might not make fiscal sense, either, so my guess is that LA Opera has found itself in a damned-if-they-do, damned-if-they-don't situation, and is trying to make the best of it. But whatever - Byrne's not dealing in such minutiae. He has bigger fish to fry.

His next target is museums and other cultural institutions around the US which, inspired by huge projects like the Bilbao Guggenheim, decided that a splashy new building (or piece of a building) designed by one of the four or five "starchitects" whose names are actually known to the wider public would be enough to generate new revenue streams and public devotion for ever and ever, amen. Once again, that's not exactly what happened, but Byrne again has a serious point to make, and it's one that's been made by many who analyze the arts world for a living.

But that's where Byrne stops dealing in reality, and makes his stunning leap from a defensible idea - that large arts institutions (much like banks, Fortune 500 companies, and families across America) spent much of the last 20 years thinking too much about expansion and consumption and too little about long-term fiscal security - to an absolutely absurd one...

"However this mess ends up, my thoughts are that maybe it’s time to rethink all this museum, opera and symphony funding — and I refer mainly to state funding. A bunch of LA museums just got a bailout from LA real estate king Eli Broad, and that’s great, but I suspect there will be county money involved there somewhere too. I think maybe it’s time to stop, or more reasonably, curtail somewhat, state investment in the past — in a bunch of dead guys (and they are mostly guys, and mostly dead, when we look at opera halls) — and invest in our future. Take that money, that $14 million from the city, for example, let some of those palaces, ring cycles and temples close — forgo some of those $32M operas — and fund music and art in our schools. Support ongoing creativity in the arts, and not the ongoing glorification and rehashing of the work of those dead guys."

Now, look. I'm all for getting America's commitment to arts education back up to a civilized level, but this argument has honestly become the last refuge of the damned in the cultural sphere. It boils down to "I don't personally enjoy or attend the specific performance/museum/concert that recently received money from my city/county/state, and therefore I believe that said money was entirely wasted, and probably should have gone to the schools instead. Won't someone please think of the children?!" It's the arts equivalent of me saying to you: Minnesota spends a huge amount of money to give out food stamps that I never use and that are no good to me. Wouldn't that money be better spent giving poor kids an education so that they won't grow up to need food stamps?

Moreover, in the rush to decry and demonize government assistance of any kind to any private institution in the wake of the massive bank bailouts of recent years, I've noticed that Americans on both ends of the political spectrum have gotten exceedingly good at spotting which of their political/cultural enemies receive some level of public funding. But those same people often seem willfully blind to public funding that goes to causes or organizations that they personally value. People working in the arts or education blast huge state subsidies to build a baseball stadium for a billionaire MLB owner, but conveniently ignore (or defend) the subsidies that helped build the Guthrie Theater. Others toss around words like "socialism" when government wants to provide equal access to health care using public funds, but ignore (or defend) the enormous earmark their city/county/state received to fund a new hospital and create a few hundred jobs.

Back to Byrne, though, because he's not remotely done throwing around baseless assertions and drawing bizarre conclusions from them...

"The problem of course, as far as private funding goes, is that what billionaire wants to fund school education?"

Um, well, tons of them, actually. Your average hour of public radio contains half a dozen underwriting credits for education-based foundations funded by America's wealthy. But I'm sorry, I interrupted - you were saying...?

"Where’s the glamour in that? You don’t get your name etched in marble on the outside of a hall for that, or get invited to amazing galas, so what’s the point? That’s why I’m focusing on public and state funding — let the private funders bankroll the opry halls, if that’s where they want to hang out."

Ah, yes, that old canard. Rich people, you see, don't actually fund arts and culture because they like it or think it's important. They fund it to see their name on a building and have a private box where everyone in the hall can gaze upon them in their fur coats and other frippery. In other news, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett recently grew moustaches like the guy on the cover of the Monopoly box, started charging exorbitant rent on Park Place and Marvin Gardens, and used the proceeds to build a secret volcano lair from which to control their impending plan for planetary domina...

...oh. No. Wait. My mistake. That's what rich guys in cartoons and James Bond movies do. Bill Gates and Warren Buffett are too busy funding education and trying to cure AIDS for that volcano stuff.

At it's core, Byrne's argument boils down to this: it's not fair that so much money goes to cultural institutions that celebrate the classics when modern-day artists, musicians, and writers have to struggle for recognition and subsistence-level funding. Moreover, "it’s more important to encourage creativity than to imply that good work can only be made by professionals — your betters."

Hard to argue with that. But Byrne doesn't actually offer any solution to the problem: he just whines about imagined elitism amongst the cognoscenti, and then, like a toddler throwing a tantrum, takes his dissatisfaction with the status quo to its most illogical end: let's just blow the whole thing up! And coming from a musician who actually produces thought-provoking work on a consistent basis, that's worse than fuzzy logic. It's an attempt to start a war that will inevitably claim you as a casualty.

Music We Only Think We Know

Hip-hop might just beat out classical music as the most misunderstood and unfairly maligned musical genre in existence today. When I tell other classical musicians that I'm a hip-hop fan, the reaction tends to range from blank stares to outright revulsion. Only once or twice have I ever gotten a positive reaction of any kind. And that's a real shame, because the creativity that's out there in the rap world at the moment is truly staggering, and compared with genres like pop, rock, and country, the level of musical complexity and lyrical elegance that hip-hop employs is extremely high.

So why do so many people think rap is nothing more than violent, misogynistic garbage aimed at getting suburban white kids to dress and act like gang members from South Central LA? Well, let me turn that question around for a moment. Why do so many people think that classical music is nothing more than repetitive waltzes and elevator music played for snoozing rich people? The answer in both cases is, "Because that's the only part of the genre that gets on TV on a regular basis."

If you're not already a fan of classical music and don't know where to find the good stuff, Andre Rieu and whatever other garbage PBS airs during their endless begging sessions might be the only classical music you hear in a given month. Similarly, if you go to BET looking for hip-hop music, yes, you will find a parade of offensively talentless rappers who buy their backing beats from other people, treat women like their pets, and embrace the whole Thug Life thing. And here's the important part: real hip-hop musicians feel the same way about the rappers on BET that you and I feel about Andre Rieu. These are musical hacks who have found a comfortable niche that makes them a lot of money. Which is fine - not everyone has to be edgy and daring - but they are not to be confused with shining examples of the genre they purport to represent.

Now, I'm not one of those sorts that believes that the election of Barack Obama was some sort of magical healing balm that is going to eventually allow Americans to put all our racial baggage behind us, but I do take a certain amount of hope from the fact that he has made a point of bringing quality art and music back to the White House, and that he seems to understand that hip-hop owes as much of its legacy to slam poetry and civil rights as it does to the Sugarhill Gang. I mean, honestly: Alexander Hamilton?


(Hat tip to Bob Collins at MPR's NewsCut blog...)

But it works, doesn't it? And it comes off as passionate and real, not preachy and uptight, the way a song in any other musical genre would if it were about the same subject. By the way, that's Lin-Manuel Miranda, the Tony Award-winning actor/writer responsible for the hit Broadway show In The Heights, which makes liberal use of hip-hop, as well as a range of other genres.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that we tend to brand unfamiliar music genres in our mind as somehow being reflective not of the artistry of the people making the music, but of the stereotypes we associate with the audience for that genre. Classical music goes in the "stuffy and elitist" bin not because it is, but because we have an image seared into our brain of stuffy elitist people listening to classical music. Hip-hop goes in the "violent and angry" bin not because it is, but because we have an image of gangbangers and wannabes listening to hip-hop.

Maybe hip-hop just isn't your thing, and that's perfectly fine. Bruckner leaves a lot of people cold, too. I'll personally never be a big fan of Motown, though I can recognize that it's quality stuff. But I'm always amazed at the number of musically sophisticated people who've never really even given rap a chance to impress them. If you're one of them, and want to rectify that, Minnesota's actually an excellent place to start...

Beethovening

Yes, Sam and I are hours away from our first Inside the Classics show - we finished our second rehearsal this morning and now I'm home for a few hours of script touch-ups and last minute prep. As Sam said, we've been too busy to even talk about the show this time 'round! I promise I'll have some thoughts for you next week.

In the meantime, I couldn't let this bit of arts news go, because I can't think of a stranger combination (Lady Gaga and the Bohsoi? Really??). Can anyone out there think of a stranger mash-up???

Bottle Music

Several things can be deduced from this clip: 1) Some people have a lot of time on their hands; 2) The "Toreador Song" from Bizet's Carmen is firmly entrenched in popular culture; and 3) David Letterman sounds to be tone deaf.

Meformer, youformer

An interesting blurb on categories of internet social networking users (although, I mean, come on, couldn't they have come up with something a bit catchier than "meformer"?). Basically, social networkers break down into 2 categories - people posting about their current activities/emotions (80% of users) and those sharing non-personal information (news links, for instance).

In my downtime (or if I'm procrastinating on score-studying/script-writing), I can become a Facebook junkie, and I'm Twitter a few times a day - often to check up on tweets from the several dozen people/organizations that I follow, from the Berlin Philharmonic to Nico Muhly. Certainly any arts organization that's halfway with the times maintains an online presence on the major social networking sites, but sometimes it feels like this is done through the need to pay lip service to new technologies rather than to actually use them to the advantage of the organization.

Then there are those who consider utilizing the online medium to its fullest advantage; some progressive thoughts here from the new CEO of the Columbus Symphony (which has just weathered a particularly trying time) about live streaming (with which, coincidentally, the Berlin Philharmonic has been experimenting).

I'm particularly interested in the proposed collaboration with InstantEncore (full disclosure; a friend is COO of the company) and the various services it provides. I firmly believe that establishing this kind of wide presence (and wide access of product) is crucial to the future or symphonic concert music.

I guess I often feel that arts organizations need to think beyond meforming and informing and focus instead of youforming (can I coin that phrase?) - it's not enough to give information about upcoming concerts or share industry news; it's more about finding a way to directly engage potential (and current) audiences online. Which I definitely see some organizations doing. What's the next step we should take in this brave new world?

Late September Brevia

I'm in the home stretch of my move - house was finally packed Tuesday night, movers arrived Wednesday morning just as I was leaving for Philly, and now I'm in Washington DC between a rehearsal and performance for a show with Ben Folds and the National Symphony Orchestra. I'm driving home after the show to a now-empty house in Richmond as my husband plays his final concerts as Principal Horn of the Richmond Symphony.

I other news: it seems like every year that there's an article like this about women in the conducting field. I've kind of stopped reading them because they always say the same thing; we've made inroads (cue JoAnn Falletta and Marin Alsop), but it's still hard out there for a chick, orchestras are conservative in nature and change moves at a glacial pace, etc etc. It always bugs me that the finger is pointed at orchestras as bastions of old-school conservatism; look at the fact that there are only thirteen female CEO's of this country's 500 largest publicly traded companies.

Speaking of Marin Alsop, the Baltimore Symphony opens their regular subscription season with my friends Time for Three. They are absolutely fantastic, and great guys, to boot.

And speaking of conductors, I leave you with a virtual tour of the posh backstage pad of New York Philharmonic music director Alan Gilbert.

Riemenschmackdown!

Well, it was really only a matter of time before this issue hit the local press, and here it is now, courtesy of the Star Tribune's fine rock critic, Chris Riemenschneider. Ever since our orchestra unveiled our much-scaled-back $40m renovation plan for Orchestra Hall, I've been waiting for someone in the media to point out that the Day of Music, our wildly popular 8-year-old event showcasing all sides of Minnesota's diverse local music scene, was canceled for lack of sponsorship just weeks before the renovation announce. Riemenschneider obliges, and further points out just how relatively small the cost of putting on the free daylong festival was compared with a $40m outlay for a lobby expansion.

Now, as commentators tend to do, Riemenschneider chose to oversimplify and distort some important stuff for the purposes of making his point. Just for instance, his decision to blithely dismiss our PR staff's assertion that the renovation money wouldn't have been available to fund the Day of Music (or anything else program-related, for that matter) is typical of the willful ignorance arts journalists tend to apply when writing about the business side of the cultural world. His bizarre claim that our entire week of annual (and free) July 4th concerts in towns like Excelsior and Hudson somehow don't count as free concerts played in the Twin Cities metro is also a head-scratcher.

But Riemenschneider's larger point about the importance of events like the Day of Music is unquestionably solid. Yes, the Day really wasn't particularly focused on classical music (though the orchestra's centerpiece concert has always been packed to the gills with a thrillingly diverse audience,) and you could make an argument that, in times as fiscally terrifying as these, we have no business putting on expensive shows that have little to do with our core mission. But the reality is that, in a city with the kind of music scene that Minneapolis/St. Paul proudly sports, no presenting organization can pretend that we don't have a responsibility to reach out to anyone and everyone who supports live music in our community.

Riemenschneider sums things up fairly, if pointedly:

"Let the rich philanthropists putting up most of the renovation money get their cushier seats; that's fine. But at least a small fraction of that money would be better spent on more free or inexpensive programming, as would a good chunk of whatever the state puts up (which has yet to be decided by the Legislature and presidential cand, er, governor)

"Without the Day of Music and events like it -- which bring in the young and diverse crowds sorely missing at Orchestra Hall -- those cushier seats might not have anybody in them in decades to come."

Or to put it another way, our orchestra garners the level of support it does not just because there's a large contingent of Beethoven fans in Minnesota. It's because Minnesotans support arts, culture, and music of all kinds at a level that puts most larger American cities to shame. And while we might be the biggest arts gorilla in town, our long-term fate is inextricably bound up with the health of that vital cultural scene that so many here have been supporting all their lives.

Let me be clear: I understand fully why the Day of Music got canceled this year, and I actually believe it was the right call. Corporate support for the event went from generous to nonexistent at the exact same moment that we (and every other orchestra in the US) were hit by a tsunami of financial woe. The #1 goal has to be to stop the bleeding and stabilize the organization, and that means some tough calls have to be made, and those calls are going to make some people upset.

But I hope that, when the dust finally clears and the economy stops shifting under our collective feet every few minutes, people like Chris Riemenschneider are still there to remind us that we owe one to Minnesota's music scene, and that it's time to pay up.

Driven to Distraction

An article in Sunday's Chicago Tribune talked about the impact of skyrocketing parking rates and 24-hour meters on the Windy City's cultural institutions. Basically, the article's thrust is that "getting folks to come out to your entertainment venue involves convincing them that they're going to enjoy themselves, but no one enjoys stressing out about parking, and that stress has become increasingly difficult to escape."

This is a problem everywhere in America, especially in cities like Minneapolis/St. Paul, where almost everyone seems to drive everywhere. Urban sprawl has also given rise to a class of arts aficionados who are used to parking for free in vast suburban lots, and consider city density to be a major inconvenience that makes them far less likely to spend an evening downtown. Those living in the urban core (and my bike-commuting, transit-riding self is definitely guilty of this) often dismiss these suburbanites and their gripes with a roll of the eyes and a rant about how spoiled Americans are, but the truth of the matter is that arts groups cannot afford to be even the least bit dismissive of anyone at a time when we should be endlessly grateful to every person who even considers coming through our doors.

Unfortunately, those same arts groups usually aren't in a position to do much about the problem. Some orchestras (ours included) offer discounted parking to subscribers, or run special shuttle buses from various suburban malls to concerts, and that's nice, but the vast majority of audience members are still going to drive themselves to the show, and when they're angry at having to pay $9, $12, or even $20 to park within an easy walk of the show they're attending, it's not the parking ramp attendant who gets vented at - it's us.

We do a fair amount of audience research for Inside the Classics, and whenever we ask about negative parts of the concert experience, we get loads of people who thought everything that went on inside the hall was great, but ohhhhhh, the parking situation! And the construction! And the traffic downtown! We used to get even more complaints than we do now, back when the ramp immediately across from Orchestra Hall was prominently labeled "Orchestra Hall Parking Ramp," leading many to assume that we owned it, or at least had some control over it. We didn't, and we don't, and the people who do were kind enough to change the name to the "11th & Marquette Ramp" at our request a while back.

Some orchestras (like the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra) address the issue by meeting the suburban audience where it lives, playing regular run-out concerts at small venues in first- and second-ring suburbs. It seems to work well for the SPCO, but some think it just encourages people's wrongheaded notions about cities, and a pragmatist would point out that moving a 33-piece chamber orchestra around the metro is a heck of a lot less expensive than moving a 95-piece symphony orchestra. As if to prove the point, the Minnesota Orchestra had to cancel a popular suburban concert series in Mahtomedi last year for lack of funding.

So what about it? How much do issues like the high cost of parking downtown affect your ticketbuying decisions? And what do you think those of us putting on performances in the downtown core ought to be doing about it?

Old school, new school

An interesting exchange recently about arts education regarding an Ofsted report on art in primary and secondary schools and artist David Hockney (whose work I’ve know since I was a kid – his stage set for L’enfant et le sortilege resided in a contemporary museum a few blocks from my childhood home). The point of contention; that elementary school-age boys were not interested in the visual arts when instruction focused more on drawing and painting than on use of technology (digital cameras and computer graphics programs). Hockney counters that it’s a matter of quality tutelage vs. “bad, boring teachers”.

Hockney also asserts: "I was appalled when I read that school inspectors say boys are turned off art when it's too heavily focused on drawing and painting…It's a bit like saying schools shouldn't be bothering with grammar.”

Despite my avid interest in every great new thing, be it technology, pop culture or gadgetry, I’m a huge back-to-basics person. One can’t really fathom the next step in the development of an art form, be it sculpture or music, unless one has a firm grasp of both the basic building blocks/techniques and the long-standing traditions. It’s difficult to advance a technique unless you’ve fully mastered its mechanics; it’s harder still to rebel against tradition unless you have an ingrained understanding of it.

The flip-side, of course, is a willful adherence to an outmoded methodology just for the sake of tradition, which I find just as problematic.

From the musical side, in my frequent collaborations with young composers, I find that those with the most rigorous training in traditional harmony, formal analysis and counterpoint are the ones who are best able to take an innovative approach that finds full expression. Composers who have only a very basic grasp of theory and analysis (and you would be surprised at how many fit the bill), no matter how creative, are in the short-term unable to practically express those fresh ideas, and in the long-term much less able to keep developing them.

What makes me particularly supportive of Hockner’s critique is that he himself has successfully integrated his “traditional” training in color and composition with newly available technology; his latest exhibit is of works drawn and painted using a computer – it’s nice to see someone “walk the talk”.

Defiant Cockroaches Are We!

Every April, orchestra consultant and tireless analyzer of all things classical Drew McManus gives his blog over to an event he calls Take A Friend To the Orchestra Month. Throughout the month, he solicits guest editorials from folks all over the music industry (I wrote a decidedly tongue-in-cheek episode way back in 2005) on the general subject of how to bring newbies into the orchestral fold. To be honest, a lot of what he gets back is of either the way earnest or way bitter variety, both of which are certainly attitudes that pervade the classical music business, but neither of which hold any particular allure for me.

But every once in a while, a TAFTO entry comes along that just floors me, and not only perfectly reflects the way I wish orchestras would conduct themselves, but also gives me new perspective on how audiences and outsiders may or may not perceive us. No surprise that this year, it's Boston composer/critic Matthew Guerreri who's knocked it out of the park. Sarah and I have both linked to Guerreri's work in the past at his excellent blog, Soho the Dog, and in response to Drew's request for an article, he's instead turned in a cartoon that says, in very few words, everything that orchestra musicians and managers need to be hearing in these trying economic times.

Guerreri's prescription for orchestras struggling to sell tickets in a depressed economic climate is simple: "Don't apologize. Don't explain... Just let 'em hear the loudest, craziest thing you've got." Essentially, he's warning against the temptation for orchestras to turtle and play nothing but Classical's Greatest Hits in a downturn, when such an approach will likely appeal only to those who never stop coming to our concerts anyway. Why not take advantage of dwindling box office to showcase truly daring concert experiences and see who comes out of the woodwork to watch?

Guerreri's cartoon dog also points out (as I did a couple of weeks back) that so-called experts have been predicting the demise of orchestras for decades, and declares that our refusal to go along with the doomsday scenarios makes us "the sexy vampire of music." I like it. And I like "the defiant cockroach of the post-nuclear cultural wasteland" even better - there's gotta be a way to work that into next season's brochure, doesn't there?

Anyway, go read the cartoon. You'll be glad you did. Oh, and if you're so inclined, you might think about taking a friend to the orchestra this month...

Just for the joy of it

Before I get started, Happy Tax Day! (OK, fine, it's not a happy day for the vast majority of us, but now at least we'll be done with it for another year.)

An interesting article in the New York Times today ; it's a slice-of-life piece on a young violinist in central Ohio and her decision to attend nursing school ("Everybody gets sick", she says) rather than going away to college to become a music teacher (noting that arts in schools are often the first to be affected by budget cuts). Blame for thwarted dreams is placed on our uncertain times, when virtually-assured employment trumps pursuit of one's passions. The article follows her to a high school orchestra competition in New York, and it's the final line that caught my attention:

What role music will play in her life, she doesn’t know. But for now, at least, she is on a New York stage, wearing a borrowed black gown, playing a borrowed eBay violin, and Tchaikovsky holds her.

What struck me was the "either/or" assumption here; either she attends college to become a music teacher or she gives music up completely to pursue nursing.

I've taught a great deal over my career so far - everything from theory and eartraining classes to conducting lessons and chamber music coachings, to all levels of students. I don't assume my students will pursue music as a profession; I certainly would not encourage a musical career, and I urge even my most gifted students not to take the leap unless they absolutely could not imagine life otherwise. In fact, I can think of few better scenarios than a talented musician entering a different field professionally, making a good living, and enjoying music on their own terms, on their own time, for their own pleasure. Why not be an active amateur musician and have the best of all possible worlds?

My father, a lawyer by trade, was an enthusiastic amateur pianist, and my most cherished childhood memories are of gathering around the piano to sing as he played, or sitting next to him and playing four-hand duets (at some point in the history of leisure time, pre-TV, such a scenario was undoubtedly more common!). His skill as an organist was what helped him fund his college education, so he must have been really good back in the day; but he was practical about the difference between making a living and having a lifelong passion separate from one's career.

One of my first jobs post-conservatory was as music director of a community orchestra - some professional musicians, but mostly amateurs - an ensemble good enough to play all the big repertoire pieces, which was fantastic for me. What struck me about this orchestra was that despite fairly disparate skill levels, the level of commitment and enthusiasm at our weekly rehearsals was astonishing, and consistent. In fact, I remember that one of my very first rehearsals with them (the group was based in Princeton, NJ) was on September 12, 2001 - and the single member missing from that rehearsal was the second trombonist, an FBI investigator, who was needed at Ground Zero.

Amateur music-making can be of incredibly high quality, but really, near-professional quality is not necessary for the deep enjoyment of simply making music. I believe we've mentioned the Really Terrible Orchestra on this blog before - the "cream of Edinburgh's musically disadvantaged" - clearly, skill (or lack thereof!) is no impediment to relishing the experience of making music.

And then there is the "Rock Choir" which has become something of a sensation across the pond. All proof positive that there lies within all of us a fundamental creative drive, a desire to make music; not because we have to, but just for the joy of it:

Patterning

No, this isn't going to be a post about quilting or psychomotor skills, I promise!

I've written about the methodical way I approach score-study, and it came up at a discussion during brunch this morning. A non-musician friend asked how we kept all that sound organized in our brains - how do you remember what's coming next? To which I answered, it's all about pattern recognition. Or more specifically, understanding the particular patterns of pitch, rhythm and emphasis that are initially established in a piece of music, and discovering how these morph (or, occasionally, remain the same) throughout the work. Which might sound a bit clinical, but it's an approach that's useful in that it can be applied to any composer and any style.

Which all made me a bit philosophical, because isn't life all about pattern recognition? Certainly true with all human relationships; we strive to understand the patterns of those individuals around us ("normal behavior"), because a shift in the pattern indicates something has changed. Food for thought.

Maybe I'm thinking of patterns because discussions of the topic have been floating around the blogosphere lately (another "pattern" in itself? Now I'm reading into everything...) For instance, a great post about words that made their inaugural appearance in the latest Inaugural Address. It's a fascinating list of words - I particularly like the sequence "tirelessly - toiled - towards" - and was surprised that, in a post 9/11 world, "firefighter" is making its first appearance. And now I've added a word to my vocabulary (hapax!).

Which reminded me of an exhibit at the Weisman I saw last fall in which artist R. Luke DuBois took State of the Union addresses and arranged words in a kind of "eye chart" according to frequency of use ("Gentlemen" made the most appearances for George Washington, "Terror" for George W. Bush). I actually attended the opening, during which DuBois did a set - he's a composer as well, and I recently discovered that he does some really interesting stuff.

My last pattern observation; when I'm wrapping up a precious few days at home, as I am now, I tend to become a bit more reflective and philosophical.

"Online" Orchestra

I've often bemoaned the slow pace of change in large arts organizations, particularly in relation to 21st century media. Which was why I was both delighted and fascinated by a recent article in the New York Times about a new "online" ensemble, the YouTube Symphony Orchestra.

In short, musicians from around the world are invited to apply by downloading sheet music provided on the site (from Tan Dun's "Internet Symphony No. 1") and submitting a video of themselves playing the selection. There's even a video of Tan conducting, to keep you in absolute tempo, because the winners of this audition will then be part of a mash-up to create an online "performance" of the entire piece.

The other component is the video submission of a standard repertory piece - that puts you in the running for a chance to play the live version of the "Internet Symphony" at Carnegie Hall, if you are selected by YouTube viewers in an American Idol-style selection process, of course.

A great use of modern media and technology, in my book, and I'll be curious to see the final product(s). Part of the purpose, ostensibly, is to create a more organized dialogue about classical music on YouTube, which is a fine idea. I cringe a little, however, when thinking about comments that may be left on audition videos; I've seen enough snide (if not downright cruel) comments attached to individual performance videos to know that the anonymity of the internet allows for a degree of mean-spiritedness usually not seen in face-to-face interactions. The eternal optimist, I hope to be pleasantly surprised!

Of course, the project has its celebrity promoters - Tan Dun and Michael Tilson Thomas, or course, and the inimitable Lang Lang lends his own peculiar flourish. My burning question, though, is this; isn't the "Internet Symphony" simply a glorified expansion of the Olympic Medal Cermony Theme from the 2008 Beijing Olympics (with a bit of Eroica added in for good measure)? Which seems such a terribly unoriginal musical idea for such an innovative project. Take a listen and judge for yourself (the Olympic Theme becomes recognizable at about 1:06').




And here's the Olympic music (with Tan conducting, too!) for comparison.

Bully pulpit

The Louisville Courier-Journal just ran a commentary/critique that reminded me of how far we've come in our expectations of an optimal concert experience.

The gist of the article: the Louisville Symphony presented a concert with Beethoven - Prometheus, Strauss - Metamorphosen, Beethoven - Symphony No. 3, a program in which the first two pieces connect thematically to the Symphony. The critic's complaint? That there was passing mention of this fact in the program notes, but nothing more was made of it. As he writes:

Still, consider how much more could have been accomplished. What if Mester had asked the orchestra to play a snippet from the "Prometheus" incidental music in which the "Eroica" tune appears? Then the orchestra might have followed up by playing the excerpt from Strauss's "Metamorphosen" that also alludes to the symphony?

It's lovely to have pre-performance comments by orchestra CEO Brad Broecker and a board representative, but that's no substitute for having the music director inform their listeners. All it takes is a little planning and, yes, imagination.


Which, to me, points out to the tremendous sea change that has been going on in our business. The implication is that it's not enough to entertain; the point is to educate and enlighten. This is particularly important in the context of current cultural norms; whereas 50 year ago, we may have been able to assume a certain level of knowledge about orchestral music and standard repertoire, these days, with the push to expand and diversify audiences, we can no longer make those assumptions.

What was even more fascinating to me was the direct plea to the music director to do some pre-concert explanations - certainly many organizations have pre-concert lectures (including the Minnesota Orchestra - the "Music Up Close" program), often led by a musician or musicologist or sometimes the conductor of the concert. More to the point, the suggestion in the Courier-Journal was for the explanation to involve the orchestra, to essentially be an integral part of the concert experience for the entire audience, not just an added extra for people who bothered to show up early.

Speaking from the podium is a topic that I've frequently
addressed, and it's a major feature of my work. After all, conducting is the ultimate bully pulpit, why not use the opportunity to enlighten? As I keep saying, the concert experience will undergo further (and maybe radical) changes within my career lifetime, and it behooves us all to think about what keeps audiences engaged and enthralled.

What it means

No doubt that these are rough times for all. Although here in southeast Texas (where I am for a guest conducting week), the economic climate is a bit more upbeat. Still, it's hard not to get swept up in the sense of gritted uncertainty.

But sitting on yet another flight (my sixth in 12 days!) today I have a small moment of clarity and conviction. I'm reminded that whenever I need comfort, I turn to music. Whenever I need a brief escape from the pressures of life, I turn to music. Whenever I need a reminder of my essential humanity, I turn to music.

And I think of the audience in Orchestra Hall last week, at the end of a dreadful tumble of days, some faces preoccupied, of course, but some faces transported. It reminds me that what we as musicians do is vital, now perhaps even more. And that all art provides an imperative reminder of what it means to be a thinking and feeling being. And that no number of bank closures can change that fact.

And that the world is always better with a bit of such idealism.

Seriously, folks...

In a recent New Yorker article )"Why So Serious?"), Alex Ross discusses the ritualization and relative rigidity of the format of modern-day classical music concerts. Included are the usual suspects: the overture-concerto-intermission-symphony format; the insistence on silence between movements of larger works; the curatorial aspects of creating an "intellectual journey" through the combination and chronology of repertoire; and the general seriousness that hovers over all of the proceedings, which seems to "elevate and stifle the music in equal measure". Perhaps the most quotable line: "The overarching problem of classical music is the tuxedo".

Certainly an oversimplification, but it's hard not to agree with much of Ross's premise. It made me ruminate over the eternal debate about applause, and when (and how) it should occur. On one hand, there's something thrilling about the expectant hush that comes over an audience when the baton is raised; on the other, there's something awkward about consciously silenced enthusiasm after a spectacularly well-played first movement. Why delay the expression of delight? In the early 19th century (the era of the "potpourri" programming) the first movement of a work may have very well been the only one heard - intermingled with other works, often more of the "light classical" vein. Audiences were apt to mill and murmur and applaud when they felt applause was warranted, even if it was in the middle of a piece.

This made me think back to a concert I conducted last weekend at the Mann Center in Philadelphia with acclaimed alt-rocker Ben Folds and members of the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia (COP), which was a blast for me (it's always fun to work with people whose upcoming albums you pre-order on iTunes). Although it was a "concert with orchestra", the capacity crowd of several thousand was certainly there for Folds and not for the COP (and most likely, few were regular classical concertgoers), and thus it was a perfect environment in which to observe audience reactions unaffected by expected standards of classical concert behavior.

Interestingly, they acted much like 19th century concert attendees would: there was a constant milling, the movement of people coming from/going to the concessions area; an underlying murmuring; spontaneous applause from different sections of the house in reaction to different elements (from humorous song introductions to the brief violin solo in the middle of one of the charts); people shouting out requests (read the section in the Ross article about Liszt); enthusiastic hooting when a particularly popular song began. There were a couple of numbers where there was a smattering of (quasi) rhythmic clapping, one song where Folds asked the crowd to act as the chorus of "oooo"s (in triads, no less!), and several in which there was a palpable quietness because of the nature of the music (notably "Fred Jones Part 2" and "The Luckiest"). In short, appropriate responses to the ebb and flow of music and emotions within a concert experience.

Neither I nor the orchestra (or, presumably, Ben Folds!) was ever distracted by what was going on in the crowd, which was never rowdy or disrespectful (in fact, Folds gave an extended shout-out to the COP and orchestral music in general); there was an interaction and a clear connection between those of us onstage and those in the audience; and both performers and concertgoers left with a feeling of satisfaction that comes from sharing the ephemeral experience of well-played live music.

While realizing that this sort of concert experience would be difficult to duplicate in the classical concert hall (and would certainly not work for particular repertoire), it's clear to me that it's the kind of thing that makes people want to go out and spend their hard-earned money in a sober economic climate to hear live music. And the irony is that it's also the kind of behavior that is discouraged in the average orchestral performance.

The other thought that arose from reading the Ross article was the expectation of a "clockwork routine" in orchestra concerts - two halves, each 40-50 minutes in length. It's given us all a somewhat inflexible notion of how long concerts, or pieces of music within a concert, should be (which is why some people are thrown off by, say, the colossal nature of Mahler symphonies). It reminded me particularly of some of the commentary we received over the course of our first season of "Inside the Classics", notably the sentiment that a 24 minute piece (like "Appalachian Spring") didn't constitute enough music for an entire second half of a concert. While I understand people's preferences for a certain amount of similarity to a "conventional" orchestra performance, it seemed lost on those who critiqued the timing of the featured pieces that the very premise of the series was to create a different way of approaching a concert experience. Which just goes to show how ingrained those expectations of an orchestral concert experience are.

Balancing the need to meet a certain amount of expectation with the need to push boundaries is the crux of the issue, and it's hard to know if the proper equilibrium is being struck. But seriously, that's the trick, isn't it?

Maybe We Should Start Painting Our Faces?

A cool new study came out last week, in which researchers asked a wide-ranging sample of music fans to describe aspects of their personality, then used the data to correlate different types of people with the genres of music that best suit them. The study's been getting a fair amount of play in the arts press this weekend, largely because one of the more amusing findings is that classical devotees have a lot in common with heavy metal fans.

There are some hare-brained ideas about why this might be: "Out of all of the main genres of music heavy metal and classical are the ones which require the most discipline to play – they're technically very difficult and involve playing at inhumanly fast speeds," said one fan of both genres in the UK's Independent newspaper. I don't know about that - it seems to me that jazz deserves to be in that conversation as well, and I'm not sure I buy the idea that most metal bands are all that technically accomplished - but I do find plausible the assertion of the study's author that classical and metal fans share a "love of the grandiose." (Think Wagner's Ring cycle as an analogue for your average KISS show - plenty of costumes, pathos, shrieking, and over-the-top emotion in each.)

One interesting part of the survey that isn't getting reported on much is the finding that classical fans, while "creative and at ease with themselves, [are] not outgoing." I wish I could say this surprises me, but it doesn't. 80 years of being told that your favorite music is anachronistic and elitist by the supposed mainstream music press will have that effect on people.

I also wish that we could measure today's most devoted classical listeners with those from 100 years ago, before the culture of recorded sound took hold. There's a huge subset of classical listeners today who rarely if ever bother to venture out to the concert hall, because they find themselves invariably disappointed by Local Orchestra X's failure to reproduce exactly their favorite recording of Great Work Y. It's sad, because I've always felt the same way about classical music that I do about hockey - you're just not really experiencing it unless you're actually there live and in person, and the best parts of both experiences will never be fully translatable on TV, radio, or CD.

And now that I think about it, I'll bet Metallica and Black Sabbath fans feel the same way...

Into the wild

Well, not really, I'm heading up to Maine and Vermont to festival hop with my husband (a rare pleasure, as we seldom get to travel together, and I've taken time off this summer to do just that). I'm not sure what internet connectivity will be like, so posting will be spotty for the next few weeks.

I leave you with this:



The opening ceremony of the Olympics was stunning, immensely impressive and cinematic in scope; but what really struck me was Lang Lang's presence in the middle of it all, a testament to the rise in popularity of Western classical music and to Lang Lang himself. A lot of food for thought there, that I'll hopefully get to before too long.

Hope everyone is enjoying some time off this summer!!

Best Day of the Year. (No, Really.)

As you probably know if you're reading this blog, we're kicking off the Minnesota Orchestra's Sommerfest this weekend, beginning as usual with the massive, day-and-night-long Day of Music. Considering how many thousands of people this event draws every year, it's difficult to imagine that anyone who regularly attends the orchestra hasn't been yet, but if you haven't, for some reason: for God's sake, get yourself down to Peavey Plaza tomorrow! Yes, all the performances are still 100% free, and yes, that means first come, first seated for the indoor shows, and yes, that does mean you have to get there super early if you want to see us play Tchaikovsky's 5th at 8pm, but honestly, even if you don't make it into Orchestra Hall at all, the rest of the acts should keep you more than satisfied. (Unless, of course, it thunderstorms, which I'm told is a possibility. If it does, I think we can all assume that it's Paul Douglas's nefarious revenge on his former employer and our Day of Music media partner.)

When a couple of our management types, now long gone from the organization, conceived the Day of Music back in the early part of this decade, I'm not sure they had any notion that it would become the local music phenomenon that it has. The acts that have played on our stages over the years run the gamut from electronica to roots rock to hip-hop to world beat to old-time folk, always with a healthy dose of the kind of straight-ahead club rock that Minneapolis is known for. I've loved it from the start, and more than once, I stayed at the hall all night after we finished (one year, I even got to introduce Gary Louris of the Jayhawks and Adam Levy of the Honeydogs to a screaming crowd at a midnight show,) finally heading home when the children's music started up on Saturday morning.

Oh, and the orchestra plays as well. And that's actually one of the great ironies of the whole enterprise: supposedly the centerpiece of the whole event, the orchestra actually winds up being just another performance in the massive slate. Much of what gets written by local rock critics about the Day of Music doesn't even mention that our staff are the ones who book, coordinate, and organize the entire operation. It's a counter-intuitive way of marketing yourself as an orchestra, but I love that someone had the guts to try it, because it makes the whole day seem like Minneapolis's event, not the Minnesota Orchestra offering a supporting role to a few bands. And despite the enormous expense (in both money and time) of putting on a free event of this magnitude, I know that it's worth it, because the people who fill the hall for our 8pm concert are always the most enthusiastic crowd we see all year long, and a fair number of them have told me they've never been to see us before, and that they're definitely coming back.

Anyway, like I say, if you've never been, you need to come. The Day of Music kicks off Friday at noon, and runs through Saturday at 3pm. (They'll take an overnight break this year from 1am-9am, which makes me a little bit sad, but is probably a good idea, since the years I stayed all night, the spectators tended to be outnumbered by the musicians and staff by 3am .) If you're looking for a few great acts worth seeing, Star Tribune pop critic Chris Riemenscheider's got you covered. I like his list, and I'd throw in the Honeydogs (8pm on the Peavey Plaza south stage,) the Spaghetti Western String Company (10pm over on WCCO-TV's plaza stage,) and the Charles Lazarus Group (4pm on Peavey north) as well. See you there...

Postscript, 10.49pm: Okay, fine, so everything outdoors got rained out before 10pm. Whatever. We had fun inside. And it's actually sort of amazing that we got through seven full years of this event without a rainout, so I guess we were due. (I'm still blaming Paul Douglas, though. His known pal Don Shelby was walking all too casually around the plaza about three hours before the deluge, and I'm guessing he was doing an elaborate slow-motion rain dance on Doug's behalf...)

Where You Least Expect It

I'm spending today and tomorrow making the long drive back to Minneapolis from the East Coast, and at the moment, I've stopped for coffee and a nostalgic look around at my old college town of Oberlin, Ohio. From what I've seen so far, not much has changed, although the downtown storefronts look like they could use a lick of paint, and the hummus plate at the coffee shop at the corner of Main and College Streets has gone severely downhill since my time.

I didn't actually intend to write a blog post here, but driving in from Cleveland, I had one of those fun, unexpected on-the-road experiences, and thought I'd share. Back in the day, when I was an idealistic college student obsessed with radio in all forms, I was a secret fan of a talk radio host at Cleveland's WTAM-AM named Mike Trivisonno. Triv wasn't exactly the most erudite guy on Ohio's air - in fact, he pretty much reveled in being the least, filling the familiar talk radio role of championing the uneducated, blue collar white guy (for you Minnesotans, think of an aggressively Italian version of Joe Soucheray.) But he was damned entertaining, for the most part, and captured the spirit of the decaying but scrappy Cleveland perfectly, to my mind.

Anyway. There I am, earlier today, cruising by downtown Cleveland on Interstate 90, when I realized that it was just about the time of day that Triv used to come on the air. Out of pure curiosity, I tuned in AM1100, assuming that his slot was probably no longer his, and that I'd shortly be listening to Sean Hannity, or some other syndicated loudmouth. But there was Triv, right on schedule, and sounding like he was still doing more or less the exact same show he did when I was in college - two parts sour old coot, one part stand-up comic, and about eight parts professional contrarian. Nothing you'd want to listen to for hours on end, but I was happy to stay tuned for a bit.

And then, without warning, it happened. Coming back from a commercial break. Triv told one of his interns to turn on his mic and introduce himself. The kid, who sounded about 19, did, and Triv then asked him to describe what he'd done the previous evening. "Oh!" said the intern. "I was down at Public Square, watching the Cleveland Orchestra!"

I cringed. I've heard hard-boiled talk radio types bring up classical music before, and while it's not always a guarantee that they're about to go on a populist rant against snobbery and boredom, it's a surefire thing that they aren't going to have the slightest clue what they're talking about. So I was shocked to hear Triv immediately come back with, "Now, I heard they had about 80,000 people out there, which is just awesome, 'cause you know, that orchestra of ours, they say it's one of the best in the world!" (Which it is.) He went on to ask the intern about the racial and economic makeup of the crowd, and was audibly pleased to hear that it wasn't "the kind of snobby ties and suits crowd you might probably see when they're playing at Severance Hall."

At this point, one of the producers jumped in to point out that, actually, the crowd at Severance tends to be pretty diverse and casual, as well, and the intern confirmed it. I figured this would be the end of the conversation, but instead, Triv wanted to know when the intern had gotten into listening to classical music, and what he liked about it. This went on for ten minutes, an eternity in drive-time talk radio, as the self-professed "dumb Italian guy" of Cleveland radio extolled the virtues of, arguably, America's greatest symphony orchestra. And the fact that he went right back to talking about his poker weekend in Vegas and the local idiots who think Travis Hafner has been taking steroids after the next break just made the whole thing more satisfying.

One of the toughest things about selling classical music as a general interest entertainment these days is getting past the fact that it's just not even on the cultural radar screen for a large percentage of the public anymore, at least not in the way that movies, pop music, and Christie Brinkley's divorce are. (Many orchestra subscribers would probably prefer that it remain that way, too, which is one of the major reasons that it does.) And while I don't want to imply that ten minutes of relatively lightly informed music talk on a news/talk station equates to progress, it makes me happy.

And, hopefully, it's awakened me enough that I've got another few hours of driving in me before this day is over. Have a good holiday weekend, all, and if you don't have plans for the 4th, you might consider catching Sarah and the orchestra just before the fireworks on the shore of Lake Minnetonka out in Excelsior tomorrow night...

Cutting remarks

Some last-minute work before we have to return the tile-cutter to Home Depot (truth be told, I'm wary of anything with spinning blades and happily let Paul do all the cutting). We wanted to retile the floor, too, but doesn't look like we'll be able to get around to that before I leave for Minnesota on Saturday.

Day 5: Tavener, The Bridegroom followed by Public Enemy, He got game

Who says an iPod can't have a sense of humor (and an ironic one at that)?

Listening to Public Enemy took me back to the mid-90's and the East Coast-West Coast hip-hop beef, Biggie vs. Tupac, Bad Boy vs. Death Row, etc. Imagine my delight to discover (with thanks again to Alex Ross) a monster summer jam devoted to calling out the likes of James Levine, the Kronos quartet and eight blackbird from the new-music duo Hybrid Groove Project. Holla!

Penultimate

Grouting is done!

Day 4: Brahms, Violin Concerto, III

Can someone explain to me the reasoning behind using this piece in the 2007 film "There Will Be Blood" (which I enjoyed immensely on DVD two nights ago)? The Johnny Greenwood is great, the Part works really well, but the Brahms seems so incongruous to me. Entertainment Weekly says "Leaps of romantic chordal grandeur from Brahms' Violin Concerto in D Major announce the launch of a fortune-changing oil well down the road from Eli Sunday's church — and then, much later, announce a kind of end of the world", but I don't know if I buy it. Any other thoughts?

Almost done

As you can see, the tiling is done; all that's left to do is grout, seal and install a door.

Day 3: Dead Milkmen, RC's Mom

Huh? you say. For those of you who aren't from Philadelphia, didn't go to college in the 90's or are not aficionados of the punk rock scene, you probably wouldn't know the Dead Milkmen. Even if you did, you might not remember this track, the second off of 1988's Beezlebubba, which includes the following lyrics:

Gonna beat my wife
Look out!

Wife beatin'
Mistreatin'
Wife slappin'
It happens


(Sung in a soul/funk style).

At first, I didn't recognize the song (or who it was by), and was thus a little horrified (I'm not big on domestic violence, to say the least). And I was a bit confused, as I figured it had to be an ironic commentary on something, but I couldn't remember the context. Then I recognized the deconstructed funk groove and the James Brown-esque caterwauling as the creation of the idiosyncratically humorous punksters that are the Dead Milkmen. And I remembered the context; in 1988, Brown was briefly jailed for, yes, beating his wife (this was in his violent PCP phase), so the song is indeed an ironic commentary.

It made me think of how some music is so topical as to be rendered unlistenable unless it's within a specific context. The Dead Milkmen track is odd, derivative and offensive unless you understood when and about whom it was written (and then you might still find it offensive, but that's just a matter of taste!). So, in a way, it doesn't really stand up to the test of time.

Is the test of truly great music whether it can be taken simply as music, out of any existing context? I thought immediately of pieces like Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique; if we detached the music from the narrative of the artist's opium induced haze and obsession with his beloved, does the music stand up? For me, it certainly does; there is a musical progression that's both organic and logical that takes place over the course of the movements, from the yearning of the first two movements to the ominous rumbles at the end of the third that foreshadow the increasingly violent and macabre expression of the fourth and fifth movements. Sure, it's more fun to listen to that last movement imagining witches cackling and skeletons doing a grotesque round dance, but the music would work on its own regardless.

That's narrative context; what about historic context? Do we need to know that Beethoven had conceived of his Eroica Symphony as an homage to Napoleon (or even that he had Republican leanings) to enjoy the music? I think not. And that is, in large part, what makes that music great; it needs no context, because it is empirically powerful and moving.

As a more modern example, I thought of the film scores and event-specific pieces written by John Williams (and if you haven't figured it out over the last 8 months of this blog, I'm a huge Williams fan). His film music is magic in the context of the movie it was written for, but I find them just as inventive and evocative as pure music. And I don't need to know that "Summon the Heroes" was written for the 1996 Atlanta Olympics; it's just a great orchestral fanfare, however you look at it. It's timeless.

Sinatra is timeless, as are the Beatles; I think Billy Joel is timeless, Elvis Costello. I suppose some of this is a matter of taste, but I feel like it goes beyond that; the best music of any genre has a freshness and an immediacy about it that exists regardless of when or for what reasons it was initially created. I'm not a big reggae fan, but I find a lot of Bob Marley to be utterly timeless. I wonder what music others think have stood the test of time?

Torn from the tabloids (or Scientific American)

A recent slew of opera announcements has caught my attention, not least for the fact that each of these projected productions is based on contemporary, topical and perhaps controversial subject matter.

First up, the seemingly silly, an opera based on the brief but sensational life of Playmate/golddigger/Trimspa spokeswoman Anna Nicole Smith by Richard Thomas and Mark-Anthony Turnage. At first glance, it’s a superficially sensationalist, ripped-from-the-headlines topic by the same guy (Thomas) who was librettist/composer of “Jerry Springer – The Opera”. On closer inspection, it appears that this tawdry and tragic life isn’t so far removed from countless other opera heroines, from Dalila to Carmen, who manipulated men for adoration/power/financial gain. This could be an interesting production, particularly with Turnage, a highly-respected jazz-influenced English composer who has two very successfully operas under his belt, at the helm.

Next up, another tragic story, this time fictional; an opera based on Annie Proulx’s novel “Brokeback Mountain” (yes, the very novel that yielded Ang Lee’s Oscar-winning film) commissioned by the New York City Opera. My surprise at this production came not so much from the subject/libretto (although I find the idea of a cowboy opera absolutely charming), but from the composer, Charles Wuorinen. While Wuorinen is certainly no stranger to the novel-turned opera (his adaptation of Salman Rushdie's novel, “Haroun and the Sea of Stories”, premiered at the City Opera in October 2004), he’s a seriously serialist composer whose works are notable for their unrepentant twelve-tone modernism that make little concession for populist tastes. It could be that because this story has been such a part of the contemporary cultural zeitgeist (not least for it’s honest treatment of a homosexual relationship) I have a hard time imagining it under a very different artistic/aesthetic guise. By the same token Wuorinen was highly lauded for his last effort for the City Opera (the aforementioned “Haroun”); “Brokeback” will be a reimagining that I look forward to with great curiosity.

Finally, another movie-connected opera based on Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” commissioned by Milan’s famed La Scala and to be composed by Giorgio Battistelli. Climate change has been at times a controversial topic (there are still some very vocal global warming skeptics who claim that current climate changes are due to cyclical global temperature shifts and not because of human-caused increases in greenhouse gas emissions, despite incontrovertible evidence to the contrary) and certainly a rather loose and unrestricted basis for an opera (will there be an “Ozone Aria”?). "It will be about the tragedy of our present situation," Battistelli said. "It is a great challenge, of course, to write an opera on such an unusual subject. It is certainly not the story of Romeo and Juliet." To say the least. But from a production standpoint, there is the exciting possibility of using projections, SFX and other multimedia as part of the performance experience.

Opera tends to be more cutting edge than anything you would encounter in a concert hall; the theatrical aspect certainly supports innovation. In an increasingly visual/multimedia society, it has the upper hand in terms of visibility and popularity (one only needs attend an HD Met Broadcast to see that opera certainly reaches a wide demographic). What does this bode for the future of concert music?

References

I'm always curious to see how classical music is referenced in popular culture, particularly movies - Sam and I have both written a couple of posts on the topic.

So imagine my delight last night when I caught a screening of "Ironman" during a scene in which Obadiah Stane (Jeff Bridges - who for years now I can only think of as the Big Lebowski) sits at a piano, tinkling out an unfamiliar classical-era-sounding bit of music. Or course I had to sit through the closing credits to learn the identity of the piece...which is apparently a tune from a piano concerto by none other than Antonio Salieri. This would be innocuous enough (though a little bit odd), were it not for context.

One of the central relationships in the movie is between Obadiah Stane and Tony Stark/Ironman (Robert Downey Jr., who I adore), partners in a weapons manufacturing company. Stane is the elder statesman, respected in the industry, savvy and mercenary, more business than brilliance. Stark is the younger, maverick genius, an inveterate party boy who nevertheless possesses most of the intellect, inspiration and creative spark of the pair.

(Spoiler alert) There is an underlying jealousy on Stane's part; in fact, it's Stane that sets out to destroy the younger man, setting into motion the entire plot of the film, a scenario that is oddly reminiscent of... "Amadeus". Stark plays Wolfi to Stane's Salieri, which makes it even more fitting that this is the composer being played by Stane in that piano scene. It's the kind of minute detail that's absolutely delightful in its obscure(d) reference, a cleverly hidden allusion.

The other music reference I caught (yes, yes, besides the tune from the 1966 cartoon version of "Ironman" being played in the casino scene) was the moment in which Stane (while doing something that will certainly cause Stark's death - I'll leave out the details, go see the movie!) describes the latest incredible invention of Stark's as "[his] ninth symphony" - a reference to the "ninth symphony curse", a superstition that one will die after the completion of their ninth symphony (usually a magnum opus - prominent examples include Beethoven, Bruckner and Mahler). Again, a reference that assumes a certain amount of historical/musical/cultural sophistication - which I find encouraging in a mainstream film. And fantastic action scenes, to boot! Not a bad way to spend a couple of hours on a free Monday night.

Of Rebels And Wannabes

The Classical Brit Awards were this past weekend, and I'm sure you were all glued to your TV sets watching to see what Anna Netrebko would wear, and whether Andrea Bocelli's duet with Sarah Brightman would live up to the hype.

Hmmm? You've never heard of the Classical Brits? Oh. Well, think of them as the UK-based awards show that annually attempts to make the classical genre as tacky and meaningless as the MTV Video Music Awards. Seriously - this year's big lifetime achievement honoree was Andrew Lloyd Webber. Yes, that Andrew Lloyd Webber. Apparently, the fact that the doodler behind such Broadway dreck as Jesus Christ, Superstar and Cats managed to scratch out an oratorio or some such nonsense in his spare time qualifies him as a classical composer worthy of statuary. (It's not as if there's any shortage of truly great living British composers who could have been given this award, either.)

The big story of the weekend appears to have been the fact that bad-boy violinist Nigel Kennedy was a no-show, after being told that he could not enter on a bicycle and play with the string quartet Bond instead of the house orchestra. As superstar tantrums go, this one seems awfully mild, but Kennedy seemingly has the British arts press on a string these days.

I've never really gotten the Kennedy mystique. He's certainly a talented player, and he jumped on the whole "dragging classical music out of its own stifling formality" bandwagon long before it was fashionable, but aside from that, what has he done in the last ten years to merit as much attention as he's paid by the press? When you Google his name, the first thing that pops up is still that old video clip of him playing Vivaldi with a few lighting effects, and I'm pretty sure he did that when I was in high school.

Throw in his thoroughly invented Cockney accent and his penchant for inflating his own importance to the music world whenever there's a reporter handy, and it's all just a bit much. Call me old-fashioned, but I prefer my musical rebels to be, well, musical. I'm all for busting barriers between the classical tower and the rest of the music world, but I'm not sure acting like a spoiled rock star is the way to go.

The good news is that, whether the Classical Brits recognize it or not, there are an awful lot of musicians rebelling against the norms of the business in a way that actually results in great performances of cool music that crosses genres without dumbing anything down or tarting it up. For an example, look no further than Hilary Hahn's recent collaborative performances with Idaho singer-songwriter Josh Ritter. If you ask me, any duo that can pull off this...



and this...



...in a single show is worth more attention than all the crossover garbage the Classical Brits celebrate.

Everyone play nice

Ongoing, until May 15: the Van Cliburn YouTube Contest for amateur pianists. The Van Cliburn Foundation, apart from holding their usual high-profile competition for professionals, runs an International Piano Competition for Outstanding Amateurs every few years, and the winner of this YouTube event is automatically entered into the live Competition, to be next held in 2011.

You too can view and vote for your favorite amateur pianist via this link; it's a great idea, a great use of this interactive technology to support musical activity. When I idly took a look at the YouTube page, the amateur pianist the third video down (Christopher Shih, MD), rang a bell. Days later, I received an alert from one of the many online social networking sites to which I belong (yes, I'm a big geek, what can I say...) that Christopher Shih wanted to add me to his friend list, and I put two and two together. Chris and I went to Harvard together - he was a hotshot pianist then, a successful gastroenterologist now. But he hasn't given up music and has performed in (and won!) various amateur piano competitions.

Watching those amateur videos is a true pleasure, and if you find yourself having half an hour to spare, I encourage you to take a look. The concentration and commitment put into each performance is absolutely palpable - and a few sound near-professional!