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Why do people seem to hate classical music?

65K views 347 replies 129 participants last post by  hammeredklavier 
#1 ·
That is what I have observed throughout life. It is as this music seriously offends them!
I work with two people and I have to listen to crappy commercial radio stations all day, blearing out all the latest hits, over and over again. But, while the three of us where sitting in our van yesterday one of them started flicking through the preset channels on the radio. He came across Radio 3 and Classic FM. Playing on Radio 3 was a Mozart Opera and he turned it up really loud to take the ****. The said 'I've had enough of that ****!'. They don't know I love classical music and never will. The reason behind this is why should I get abuse for something I have spent the last 22 years studying and enjoying because people are so ignorant to something they don't understand.
 
#35 ·
Well, teenagers do not like classical music, I suppose because they think it is not cool, it for old farts.

A lot of grown-up people are not better then teenagers. They do not read books, do not listen to music, just sit in office and go to some beach on holidays. I think that at least in my country, a lot of people of the young generation (and I am 28) have very narrow interests in life, they just work as some "managers" and then go to Egypt or Turkey on holidays. How boring!

And then these grown-ups decide to have children. They do not read books to them at home, and then they ask a teacher: "Why my kid do not like to read books?". And so the next generation will be the same. The same is with classical music, I suppose.
 
#37 ·
Well, in fact a friend of mine brang one day a recording of Halleluja! chorus from the Messiah. They children were excited. Maybe, teenagers are not so bad.

My own early musical memories include an LP of Brahms' Hungarian Dances (5 y.o).

But btw, I have never hated SCHOOL also! I hated only two things:
1) to wake up early (and still hate).
3) to clean the classroom


But I've always heard that situation in Europe and the USA is better. There are some people, who work in banks or corporations and play flute as a hobby. Is it true??? It's very rare in Russia, if not impossible.
 
#38 ·
Well, in fact a friend of mine brang one day a recording of Halleluja! chorus from the Messiah. They children were excited. Maybe, teenagers are not so bad.

My own early musical memories include an LP of Brahms' Hungarian Dances (5 y.o).

But btw, I have never hated SCHOOL also! I hated only two things:
1) to wake up early (and still hate).
3) to clean the classroom

But I've always heard that situation in Europe and the USA is better. There are some people, who work in banks or corporations and play flute as a hobby. Is it true??? It's very rare in Russia, if not impossible.
It's true. :D How would it be impossible?
 
#41 ·
I would be much slower than a few people here to say that teenagers default to hating classical music because they can't or don't understand it. I think this sets up a rather antagonistic them-and-us, superior/infrerior dynamic that is good for nobody. The problem is not that they can't or don't understand, but they don't see why they should bother trying to understand it in the first place. Our job, as with any people who are passionate about a relatively esoteric interest and who want to introduce it to others, is to talk about the unique facets and achievements of classical music and what a person can get out of it. Not about how great the music intrinsically is, and how stupid people who dislike it are - the focus needs to be on what the listener can get from the experience compared to other kinds of music.
 
#47 ·
I would be much slower than a few people here to say that teenagers default to hating classical music because they can't or don't understand it.
I don't think they hate it because it offends them or anything like that, I think it is purely because they don't understand it.
What? :lol:
 
#42 ·
Like many others here have said, I think alot of people simply equate classical music with old/boring and never give it a chance. However, since classical music encompasses such a wide range and variety of styles and sounds, I am very skeptical of anyone who says they don't like classical at all, if they indeed like some other type of music. That said, I know that if I told most of the people I know how much I love classical, they would laugh in my face lol. However if I said I was a huge Bon Jovi fan (I'm not btw), I'd end up in an hour long conversation about how phenominal his music is. Also, I think that classical music is largely designed to evoke emotion, but I think that the majority of people don't want that...they would much rather simply have "music they can dance to", or the oft-mentioned "phat beats" lol.

In a way I can speak from experience because I used to be that way only a few years ago. All I really knew of classical music was a couple over popularized excerpts such as "Ride of the Valkyres" and "O Fortuna", and I thought that this encompassed all of classical music, and therefore never bothered to explore it more.

Or it could be that today's popular music artists are simply so much more talented musically than all of the great composers, that all of this "classical" stuff pales in comparison! (I kid, of course...please don't hurt me!!)
 
#44 ·
Being that this thread's been dredged from two years ago and the world's not much different, I'll pull out my stock answer...but preface it with a borrowing from Alfred E. Neuman.

"What, me worry?"

Money and time are spread too thin these days. They have been for a long time. No e-devices three hundred years ago. Prior to 1950, not many had TV.

Too many distractions. Classical Music (and all its subsections) is just one victim of many. I say enjoy your niche, and don't worry too much about how many are "following".
 
#45 ·
I don't think it's hate either, I think its more a misunderstanding of the music, or they just weren't given the right exposure to it when younger. I've always liked classical music myself, and it was my first love as far as music goes, and will always be what I listen to the most often. It could also just be that people don't have the time to sit down and enjoy something like Beethoven's 5th, which does admittedly take more time to listen to than say a song by Linkin Park.
 
#46 ·
I used to not like classical music due to its close acquaintence with what I thought were band nerds. Of course I listened to Green Day in those days. I really didn't have appreciation for good music at 12-14. But by my late teens, I really started getting into it. Yngwie Malmsteen definitely intrigued me with his interesting scale selections on his early albums of the 80's In particular, Rising Force. Then, I heard Vivaldi and Paganini. There is still some classical music I don't like. But I've learned to concentrate on the stuff I like.
 
#50 ·
Society simply trains people to be prejudiced toward classical music. Pop culture simply makes classical music look unattractive. If classical music is mentioned in a TV show it is often in a joke about how boring it is. Most people have seen Lord of the Rings and Star Wars but how many of them really that classical music is playing in the background?

If people didn't have a stereotype against classical music and realized its beauty what percentage of today's generation would listen top 40 garbage? I'm sure it would be a lot less.
 
#53 ·
the biggest problem as i see it with classical music that leads to hate is when you have bodys like the dwp that have a 30 secont lupe of that awfull hold music for 45 min , it just makes me want to kill someone and i usaly end up screaming at whoever answers the phone for torchring me with it , and this is one of the things that lead to the hate ,
 
#55 ·
I think it revolves around accessibility - and reaching out to people. Similar argument as to whether TV, violent games etc either REPRESENT the society we live in, or are causal & actually AFFECT it. Celebrity culture is a prime example. It's a circle & it's difficult to know where it begins or ends.
In classical music terms, does little or no coverage on TV etc reflect the relative disinterest in society or does it actually affect it. I strongly believe it is the latter and we (Classical music passionates) all need to do something about it. Amazing how Classic FM brought nearly 7 million listners out of the shadows - once they knew it was there.
 
#57 ·
The last time I visited the big HMV store in Birmingham, their meagre classical section was in a room of its own, separated with a big, glass door; almost as if it was segregating those who can appreciate classical music from the rest of society. I half expected an alarm to sound every time someone opened that door, alerting the hip tweens and twenty-somethings to the presence of someone who liked "seriously old music" :)

"Oi, wot u dooin' gooin' in theer - when wuz the last time Tcaikovsky wuz in the Top 10, eh!?" (Brummie accent exaggerated)

I think part of why people hate classical music in the UK is a mixture of ignorance, impatience, peer pressure and aggressive marketing: people don't want to try it, they haven't got the time to try it, their friends share the same opinion on it and the music industry isn't really promoting anything without Myleen Klass on it.
 
#58 ·
That is what I have observed throughout life. It is as this music seriously offends them!
I work with two people and I have to listen to crappy commercial radio stations all day, blearing out all the latest hits, over and over again. But, while the three of us where sitting in our van yesterday one of them started flicking through the preset channels on the radio. He came across Radio 3 and Classic FM. Playing on Radio 3 was a Mozart Opera and he turned it up really loud to take the ****. The said 'I've had enough of that ****!'. They don't know I love classical music and never will. The reason behind this is why should I get abuse for something I have spent the last 22 years studying and enjoying because people are so ignorant to something they don't understand.
It has to do with instant gratification and short attention spans that popular culture ingrains and nurtures in us. Classical music needs more and returns more for the investment.
However, there is a percentage of people who are grabbed by it inately and will gravitate to it.
 
#59 ·
Hi Kryten,
Same experience in HMV. Although they have a deal with Classic FM to promote their top 100 CD's, the few that were actually in stock were moved a few weks ago from under the section titled "Classical" to "World Music" - and over Christmas to a completely un-titled section, half overlapping "Jazz".
In my ealier post I said we should all take action together to promote classical music. Not suggesting "Occupy wall street" or anything but if you complain this week to the Manager in your area, I will in mine. If you give him the choice to settle things locally or have a written complaint to Head Office (& possibly 2 from different geographical areas) you never know -particularly when HMV are going bust & badly need the cash. Maybe some others on this great site will complain as well. Revolution, my friend!
 
#68 ·
From what I've observed :
-Some people are lead to believe that every classical piece are relaxing and hence boring.
-All that non-sense about classical music being the music of the elitists and snobs.
-Not enough exposure. CD stores where I live usually have a classical music section that comprises of 50% albums titled "Mozart Effect" and its variants, the other 40% are compilation albums of sell-out performers and overly popular pieces. For vocal performances, they only had Bocelli and The Three Tenors albums.
-"I'm not that smart, I can't possibly enjoy classical music!" Some people really close-minded. *sigh* Although, this is sometimes good to hear because that person you're talking to must think you're as a smart person! :p
-It's not something you can headbang to and there aren't many catchy melodies.
-No lyrics. You can't karaoke to it!
 
#74 · (Edited)
If teenagers were blasting Shostakovich conspicuously, I'm sure some people here would find reason to hate Shostakovich rather than rejoice. And BTW, I've never encountered a person who openly shared any hatred for classical music. Except of course, at this forum!
 
#75 · (Edited)
In I am a strange loop, Douglas Hofstadter writes.

"I have to admit that I have always intuitively felt there was another and quite different yardstick for measuring consciousness, although a most blurry and controversial one: musical taste. I certainly cannot explain or defend my own musical taste, and I know I would be getting myself into very deep, hot, and murky waters if I were to try, so I won't even begin. I will, however, have to reveal a little bit of my musical taste in order to talk about Albert Schweitzer and his musical profundity."

In another passage he wrote, after detailing his failed attempt to love Bartok's Second Violin Concerto.

"I need not go on and on, because I am sure that every reader has experienced chemistries and non-chemistries of this sort - perhaps even relating to the BartĂłk and Prokofiev violin concertos in exactly the reverse fashion from me, but even so, the message I am trying to convey will come across loud and clear. Music seems to me to be a direct route to the heart, or between hearts - in fact, the most direct. Across-the-board alignment of musical tastes, including both loves and hates - something extremely rarely run into - is as sure a guide to affinity of souls as I have ever found. And an affinity of souls means that the people concerned can rapidly come to know each other's essences, have great potential to live inside each other."

The general public knows, implicitly and at the back of their heads, that classical music is generally more "complex" and "deep" than the music they listen to, and they know that they cannot comprehend it, so their contempt is a defense mechanism against the realization of their own inferiority.

This is a forum where my online identity is completely separate from my real identity, so I'm not afraid of landing myself in hot, murky waters. It I can't express my indefensible beliefs here, where can I?

If you can't appreciate The Jupiter Symphony or Opus 131, that shows a deficiency on your part, not the work's.

My biggest vice is a lack of appreciation for Handel, I can't get into his operas, but I'm making progress.

Before the passage above he wrote this.

"Having painted myself into a corner in the preceding section, I'll go out on a limb and make a very crude stab at such a distinction. To do so I will merely cite two ends of a wide spectrum, with yourself and myself, dear reader, presumably falling somewhere in the mid-range (but hopefully closer to the "high" end than to the "low" one). At the low end, then, I would place uncontrollably violent psychopaths - adults essentially incapable of internalizing other people's (or animals') mental states, and who because of this incapacity routinely commit violent acts against other beings. It may simply be these people's misfortune to have been born this way, but whatever the reason, I class them at the low end of the spectrum. To put it bluntly, these are people who are not as conscious as normal adults are, which is to say, they have smaller souls. I won't suggest a numerical huneker count, because that would place us in the domain of the ludicrous. I simply hope that you see my general point and don't find it an immoral view. It's not much different, after all, from saying that such people should be kept behind bars, and no one I know considers prisons to be immoral institutions per se (it's another matter how they are run, of course). What about the high end of the spectrum? I suspect it will come as no surprise that I would point to individuals whose behavior is essentially the opposite of that of violent psychopaths. This means gentle people such as Mohandas Gandhi, Eleanor Roosevelt, Raoul Wallenberg, Jean Moulin, Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King, and César Chávez - extraordinary individuals whose deep empathy for those who suffer leads them to devote a large part of their lives to helping others, and to doing so in nonviolent fashions. Such people, I propose, are more conscious than normal adults are, which is to say, they have greater souls. Although I seldom attach much weight to the etymologies of words, I was delighted to notice, when preparing a lecture on these ideas a few years ago, that the word "magnanimity", which for us is essentially a synonym of "generosity", originally meant, in Latin, "having a great soul" (animus meaning "soul"). It gave me much pleasure to see this familiar word in a new light, thanks to this X-ray. (And then, to my surprise, in preparing this book's rather fanatical index, I discovered that "Mahatma" - the title of respect usually given to Gandhi - also means "great soul".) Another appealing etymology is that of "compassion", which comes from Latin roots meaning "suffering along with". These hidden messages echoing down the millennia stimulated me to explore this further."

He makes a sloppy attempt at articulating what makes a person "great souled", but this is sloppy and sentimental, because there are merely figures who have accomplished things he deems heroic, fitting in with his conception of the political good, etc Trying to align "great souled" with morality is difficult because different worldviews judges world historical figures differently. This directly contradicts his thesis on the link between good taste in music and "great souled-ness" because Hitler and Stalin also had good taste in music (Hitler worshiped Wagner, Stalin's favorite piece of music was Mozart's 20th Piano Concerto, Lenin was moved by Beethoven's Appassionata Sonata to tears, etc, not to mention that Wagner himself was a blackguard, shamelessly seducing the wives of his friends, etc).



It's the hardest being middlebrow, those with merely "good", "decent" taste; you have to fend off those with genuinely great taste above you, and the hoards below you. See image.

These middlebrow people are the most vicious, the most inhuman, the most cruel and most hypocritical.

The same people sending not-sure-if-serious death wishes to Rebecca Black are the same people who would bash anyone who championed Wagner in public as a "hoary hipster".
 
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