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How do we bring back Classical Music for the Average Joe ?

34K views 345 replies 68 participants last post by  Luchesi 
#1 ·
I don't need anymore explaining. Classical Music as it stands right now is not popular with the average middle class Joe.
 
#174 · (Edited)
I recall there was a whole separate thread about classical music being racist and whatnot that millionrainbows started. I recall him making very similar arguments about diversifying our music education, which were discussed at great length (almost 50 pages). However, I'm not quite sure if the topic is that relevant to the current discussion? "An average Joe" probably knows nothing about the recent most popular trends of musicology.
 
#175 · (Edited)
I recall there was a whole separate thread about classical music being racist and whatnot that millionrainbows started. I recall him making very similar arguments about diversifying our music education. However, I'm not quite sure if the topic is that relevant to the current discussion and was discussed has been discussed in a great length already.
(Wearing both moderator & poster caps in this answer) I don't think talking about racism is useful to the discussion here. But what is potentially relevant (if posters want to discuss it!) is the idea that reducing the overall "whiteness" of classical music would make it more appealing to the average Joe, who is, I suppose, not as white as he used to be.
 
#178 ·
People find classical music on their own, when the time is right. The best thing that can be done is to provide music education in our schools. Expose kids to music, all kinds of music, when they are young. All children should have the opportunity to learn to play an instrument and/or to sing in a choir, starting in Elementary school. Music shouldn't be an extracurricular activity in our schools. The rest will take care of itself.
 
#181 ·
Excellent. This just seems to be to be true, but it takes us towards the question of what schools are.

In part they are for equipping children with functionally useful skills: I am thinking here about subjects such as basic mathematics and the ability to use the official language where the school is situated.

There is also the desire to give children the skills to form their own views. For example, don't tell them that Nazism is bad; invite them to consider what Nazism advocated and did, and to think through the implications. If Nazism is bad because "teacher says so" then it could just as easily have been good because teacher said so. (Admittedly, this might not be one for 5 year olds.) The same should apply to any other "-ism".

Now take the arts. I guess the role of the arts in education is to enrich and broaden the lives of the children. You don't need to expose them, in schools, to arts experiences which saturate the everyday world. If children are overwhelmingly exposed to popular music on the airwaves, on the television, at home, with their friends, then there is no need to expose them to that in school. It is styles of music (or literature or visual arts) which they would otherwise be less likely to encounter that schools should focus on, in order to broaden horizons and open eyes. Classical music fits here, as does other non-commercial music (traditional folk, non-Western classical traditions in Western schools).

I would also see the arts as a way of bringing people together, by pointing to common humanity. In that sense the idea that this music is "white" and that music is "black" is wholly unhelpful. It may be of background interest to note that Brahms lived in a time and place when most people around him would have been white, but to label the music white as a result is unhelpful (as well as incoherent - the music emerges from a culture, not from a skin colour). If I am a black child learning the piano and am told that classical music is white music, but the blues is black music, then what is being encouraged?

Brahms' 4th symphony is excellent music of its type, and to enjoy it is open to anyone who cares to, regardless of race. If you want the "average joe" to appreciate it (which might give a lot of joes a great deal of pleasure), then expose them to the classical style at young ages and don't tell them "it is not for you, because your music is rap or rock"; tell them it is for all who wish to appreciate it.
 
#199 ·
Here is some new music I find very exciting.

Les Filles de Illighadad - Irriganan



What has been missing from a discussion of the roots of Classical music are the contributions from African, Arabic, and other outsiders, which have been significant. The lute is a European form of the oud, and European lutenists learned to play it from Arabs and North Africans. There is at least one painting which depicts two lute players with one obviously following the other, who just happens to be a dark skinned musician.

But instead of acknowledging the debt, advocates of Classical music prefer to think that their Western European music is a creation of their culture, ex nihilo, and is of higher quality than the music from other parts of the world.
 
#201 ·
I suppose another angle on the question of this thread is how much the average Joe or Jo might love music. I believe that many people enjoy music well enough but would not say that listening to music is one of the most important parts of their lives. But a small proportion of the total do seem to take music as very important to them. Even in my own family I have seen this. My brother is a professional (orchestral) musician and a large part of his life is about playing music. But he was never that enthusiastic about listening to music. I'm the opposite. I never mastered an instrument - I hated that I couldn't make it sound like it should! - but listening to music is a much bigger part of my life than his and I surely know a vast amount of music that he has never encountered. Similarly, I know many people who like alternative and indy rock music but only a few of them really take it seriously as an important part of their lives.

I think it is the same with classical music. Most of those average Joes who have been lost to classical music may not have been that involved with it anyway. And at the same time, as a result of class distinctions and so on, many people for whom some form of music is of real importance to them were in those rosy old days locked out of CM. I experienced many bad experiences with snooty audience members in classical concerts in the 60s and 70s. These days there are fewer social barriers to listening to CM but there are still many people who love music and yet have yet to discover that CM can rock their boats, too.
 
#203 · (Edited)
Enthusiast.

You make a very good point about the importance of music in one’s life. In my circle of friends there are two of us where music is a vital part of our everyday lives. I have other friends who like it well enough but it remains a peripheral thing, background music for evenings at home. They would never collect on the basis that I do and they wouldn’t know Bob Dylan from Bob the Builder. I’ve tried introducing things I like to people but it is usually met with total indifference.

Although music is a huge thing culturally in the world in general only a limited number of people are real enthusiasts and they tend to actually play or have dabbled at playing at some point in their lives.

I can play a few instruments with some ability but I knew early on that unless I invested much more time than I was prepared to I would never reach the peak that my musical heroes rested on. I played in show bands, jazz groups, rock bands and they were good but were never destined for greatness and that was fine. Now I get my musical pleasure from discovering new artists, new music and new genres and rediscovering things that I had overlooked in the past.
.

I suppose the point I’m trying to make, if indeed that’s what I’m doing, is that the love of music such as we enthusiasts who frequent a music forum have, is at the end of the day, a kind of minority interest and the idea of encouraging people to appreciate our loves is anathema to me. If you have the inclination and inner feeling for it you will discover the joy of music for yourself. It shouldn’t need forcing.

Sorry for the ramble but there you have it!
 
#223 ·
Enthusiast.

You make a very good point about the importance of music in one's life. In my circle of friends there are two of us where music is a vital part of our everyday lives. I have other friends who like it well enough but it remains a peripheral thing, background music for evenings at home. They would never collect on the basis that I do and they wouldn't know Bob Dylan from Bob the Builder. I've tried introducing things I like to people but it is usually met with total indifference.

Although music is a huge thing culturally in the world in general only a limited number of people are real enthusiasts and they tend to actually play or have dabbled at playing at some point in their lives.

I can play a few instruments with some ability but I knew early on that unless I invested much more time than I was prepared to I would never reach the peak that my musical heroes rested on. I played in show bands, jazz groups, rock bands and they were good but were never destined for greatness and that was fine. Now I get my musical pleasure from discovering new artists, new music and new genres and rediscovering things that I had overlooked in the past.
.

I suppose the point I'm trying to make, if indeed that's what I'm doing, is that the love of music such as we enthusiasts who frequent a music forum have, is at the end of the day, a kind of minority interest and the idea of encouraging people to appreciate our loves is anathema to me. If you have the inclination and inner feeling for it you will discover the joy of music for yourself. It shouldn't need forcing.

Sorry for the ramble but there you have it!
In what ways were you lucky enough to get into music? Can you remember?
 
#208 · (Edited)
Given the OP, I don’t know why we have to, yet again, be ‘schooled’ on the subject of all the music in other countries and from all other cultures and, if that isn’t enough, have to read the wonders of hip-hop and what not. On a classical music forum, are we supposed to be apologetic for thinking that CM is particularly special? Do we have to put up with being called elitists? If someone wants to get on their soapbox on the subject of the wonders of the music from other cultures, then start another thread. It’s getting old already.

I don’t think that many people who love classical music have it in their minds that anybody who loves other kinds of music is supposed to be convinced that CM is superior or that someone from another country is supposed to accept that CM as better than music they grew up with. That being said, there is something unique about classical music. I know of no other genre that has spread around the world from the places of its origin to other cultures with their own histories of music that are vastly different from that of CM.

And, please, let’s leave popular and hip-hop music out of the equation.
 
#213 · (Edited)
Baby boomers had a relatively rich exposure to classical music growing up. It was in movies and on television. Who didn’t see Fantasia growing up? Who didn’t see Bugs Bunny/Warner Bros. cartoons at theaters? CM occupied a significant section in most record stores. Tower Records had a free-standing CM store on Sunset Strip in Hollywood. It was typical that families have their children take up an instrument and have music lessons which typically emphasized classical music. It is naivety for anyone to suggest that with the increasingly limited exposure to CM during the formative years, at least in North America, the Average Joe will, on average, pick up classical music on their own without some early exposure and guidance.

Classical music is more complex and sophisticated than many other genres including hip-hop. A poster can continue to push a message that to suggest that is heresy, but the continued repetition is not going to change that fact. And inferring that one is saying that classical music is better than other music, when people have the right to their own preferences whether CM or otherwise, is just a way to try to put people on the defensive. Don’t fall for it.
 
#220 ·
In the last few years, maybe since 2000, a generation of musicologists are beginning to look critically at how the history of music has been told with an eye to giving proper credit to the forgotten artists, mostly the outsiders. But not without some controversy. Old and treasured narratives about our culture are not corrected without a backlash from vested agents of the mainstream.

Earlier in this thread my post about the Colloquy about this very history, reported by the American Musicological Society, was lampooned as nothing more than postmodern revisionism.

Sad, really.
 
#221 ·
I am now completely lost. I don't understand how this has anything to do with bringing classical music to the average Joe, or whether that would or would not be a desirable aim.
I guess slaves in Spain, or presumably Al Andalus at the time, under Moorish control, may have provided an influence. I guess also that elsewhere other influences based in the Church existed, and I guess untold singers in lands influenced by Viking, Saxon, Celtic, Slavic, Orthodox cultures, etc, etc also made music, and chipped in. I expect people exploited others everywhere you could look and both the exploited and the exploiters incorporated musical influences. My suspicion is that perhaps Europe was a real melting pot, and it is the collision which created an exceptional musical inheritance, not some strange idea that slave girls are what mattered. The point is that this all blended into a tradition, and it is that tradition which gives ongoing pleasure.
Or perhaps it was the aliens of Mong. :eek:
 
#226 ·
European concert music was really never that big with the masses. I have read in several sources that most of the people who lived in rural Germany/Austria had never heard of Beethoven.

I could not find it, maybe some here can, but several years ago a member had an excellent post on the influence on Edison and the record player had on musical culture. Prior to Edison most popular musicians were musically illiterate. With a recording they could create an account of their music without knowing the difference between a half note and a half rest. This allowed what we called call popular music to catch up and surpass classical.
 
#228 · (Edited)
European concert music had a very real presence in the cities of Mozart and Beethoven's time. It's doubtful that classical music, no matter whether during the time of Beethoven or later, had a big impact on, or presence in, rural populations which usually meant low populations and less access to concert, salon and other venues.
 
#235 · (Edited)
Getting back to what matters. Melody, harmony, and rhythm are exclusive to what form of music, or race of people? And what elitist ethnic race of people invented singing?

Stop making music about racism. That is a biased agenda that has nothing to do with the joy of making and creating music (which clearly transcends race). Music comes from the heart, or it isn't music--Herbie Hancock. Music is love--Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. We all have a heart (well, most of us do), and we all love, & we all have the impulse to make music, especially as children. So, why can't we just leave it at that?

During my elementary school years, in America, at a public school (the opposite of what it means in Britain), I was taught the viola, by my choice!, in the 2nd, 3rd, & 4th grades, before I switched over to the trumpet--which was my father's choice (because he liked Jazz)--in the 5th, 6th, and later 7th and 8th grades (before a bully that sold drugs stole my trumpet). I also sang regularly in music class. I recall that I would hum tunes to myself, quietly, on the school bus home from school everyday. I also sang in church every Sunday.

& I feel so sorry and badly for children today that don't get what I had. It should be every child's right to have music in their lives, in some way, and it should start in elementary school (and also at home). But today, the funds that were once used to go into providing music education for children are too often instead channeled into sports (& especially at the middle & high school levels--where it can potentially damage the rest of the school budget).

During my elementary school years, the sports that I played had nothing to do with my school, they all happened outside of school, that is, in addition to school, and they weren't overly expensive (other than a small portion of the equipment), as my parents could afford it. While at elementary school we had the most fantastically fun recesses!, where we all played kick ball and bombardment and climbed on a jungle gym and parallel bars every day. Not expensive stuff, budget wise (and btw, looking back, there wasn't a single overweight kid in my entire school). So, the school budget allowed for music and daily French lessons, too. Again, that was at a public school in America in the 1960s & 70s. Incredible, right?

Here's one of my heroes, and the kind of person that I wish could be in elementary schools everywhere:




Again, does it really matter what form or type of music Sonya Knussen is teaching her kids in Baltimore? No, it doesn't. She's teaching music, and her kids can go into any form or type of music they please later on in their lives, if they're so inclined, BECAUSE she's teaching them the rudiments and fundamentals of music (all music) and she's doing it very well. Yes, she's teaching them what she knows & probably what she was herself once taught (back in Britain). But what a gift!!!! to those lucky children. That's what is important, and that's all that is important. So, let's start there, and the rest will take care of itself.

For example,










ETC.

By the way, her father was a wonderful musician, too:

"Sonya's Lullaby":
Symphony No. 3:
 
#239 · (Edited)
...If you are really concerned with advocating for Classical music, you would be well served to drop the genre-supremacy argument. In my experience, starting with myself, but reflected with many of my friends and colleagues, the biggest turn-off to Classical Music are its greatest fans. Their condescending attitude toward other genres of music, is received by other more open minded music lovers as an indication that the person pushing the Classical Music supremacy line is dismissed regarding their opinions about music in general.
Another round of warm fuzzies for, well I guess just about all of us. Over the many decades I have spent close to various classical communities, I have never experienced an elitist, 'our music is better than anyone else's' attitude. The overriding feeling has been a common wonderment at how magnificent classical music is and how lucky we are to have experienced and to still be experiencing it.

Rather than all of us having been cloistered in nothing other than CM, many of us, including myself have enjoyed a lot of other music genres and have felt that we would have missed something rewarding without having had that experience also.
 
#244 · (Edited)
Another round of warm fuzzies for, well I guess just about all of us. Over the many decades I have spent close to various classical communities, I have never experienced an elitist, 'our music is better than anyone else's' attitude. The overriding feeling has been a common wonderment at how magnificent classical music and how lucky we are to have experienced and to still be experiencing it.
Yeah, the idea that the masses aren't interested in much of classical music simply because of the "elitist attitude" of classical music fans is absurd. I've been to other classical music forums, and in them I've encountered a few people who appreciate classical music and non-classical music equally; they like to always blame on the "elitist attitude" of classical music fans for everything, like literally.
The truth is, very few people (people who appreciate classical music and non-classical music equally) are actually bothered by it. 99% of people who aren't interested in classical music are not interested in it simply because they think it's boring (and their dislike for classical music has nothing to do with the "elitist attitude" of classical music fans).
 
#249 · (Edited)
Well now, this is interesting because it seems like a positive report but what do TC's members think about this list of the top 10 classical artists in the UK?

1. Ludovico Einaudi
2. John Williams
3. Andrea Bocelli
4. Max Richter
5. Luciano Pavarotti
6. Ólafur Arnalds
7. Ramin Djawadi
8. Lindsey Stirling
9. Gavin Greenaway
10. Yann Tiersen

Or these comments about the rise in Deezer playlists:

"the most notable trend is a surge of younger listeners, particularly in mood and relaxation Classical music."

"CALM PIANO focuses on "piano music to stay focused, calm down, or meditate". It features music by artists such as Nils Frahm, Ludovico Einaudi and Max Richter."

"CLASSICAL FOR SLEEP saw a huge increase in listening during lockdown. In March, there was a 284% stream increase of this playlist in the UK compared to the month before."

or my favourite:

"CLASSICAL GOES POP offers "Classical versions of your favourite pop hits". It breaks the misconception that Classical must only feature classic pieces and resonates particularly with younger fans. ... Its most popular track globally in the past year was a cover of Ed Sheeran's Perfect by the duo 2Cellos."
 
#257 ·
I'm all for Classical music not only surviving but prospering for another generation of listeners. But this article was written before covid shut down all live concerts for more than a year. We don't know how many of those venues will return, or if audience sizes will ever be as large. I really hope live concerts will return as strong as they were pre-covid since I think live music is a necessary ingredient for Classical music's long term survival.

All genres are faced with the same issue, but those that had a much larger audience pre-covid are better prepared to weather the post-covid storm.
 
#262 ·
I don't have a lot of sympathy with a view that average Joes (and Jos) should listen to classical music or even that I would like more of them to. But I do believe quite strongly that everyone should be able to access it to make up their own minds. And I believe that if this becomes the case then a small proportion of people would actually find they really like it. Access is about knowing that many people from all sorts of backgrounds enjoy classical music, knowing where to hear it, recognising that there is great variety (and few enjoy all of it) and recognising that enjoyment may take time. It is also about ensure that kids get a decent musical education at school and that some events (and perhaps even some recordings?) are subsidised so that dipping a toe in the water becomes affordable. I also support efforts to promote classical music as very worthwhile and I do not like to see our societies' opinion makers rubbishing classical music, implying it is posh people's culture or even merely advocating that it is OK to avoid it.
 
#264 ·
I don't have a lot of sympathy with a view that average Joes (and Jos) should listen to classical music or even that I would like more of them to. But I do believe quite strongly that everyone should be able to access it to make up their own minds.
You seem to be implying that something is inhibiting Average Joe from access to Classical music. But in reality, nothing is. Anyone/everyone can access and listen to Classical music as much as they wish.
 
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