Its popularity has been increasing recently, according to the RPO, BPI and Deezer:

https://www.rpo.co.uk/about/news-pr...accounted-for-a-third-34-of-classical-streamers-worldwide-in-the-last-12-months

The report:

https://www.bpi.co.uk/media/2518/the-classical-revival-2020_final.pdf

 

The question is wrong. It never was popular, which is why music is characterized as ‘Classical’, ‘Pop’, ‘Jazz’, etc. It was more respected than it is now by the General Public. A few generations of using it as background music for on hold, elevators, etc hasn’t helped. The absence of a requirement to learn to play an instrument in order to hear music in the home has decreased the appreciation of all Music. And the hegemony of rock and roll killed off many genres, such as Broadway Musicals, Classical, Jazz….

 

The paradox of saying "Pop/rock is so much more popular than classical" is that many pop/rock musicians like classical and often borrow themes.

On YouTube comments I often see comments from younger listeners who like at least a few works. Classical may be appreciated more than we realize.

 

What do you think would have to happen for classical music to become relevant to the people again?

I think for new classical music to become mainstream relevant the first thing is there would have to be a return of melody, a musical form that has been increasingly discarded by many forms of music including a lot of popular music and a lot of film music.

Think of any song or tune or piece of music that is dear to you, that you know from memory and hum to yourself, and see if it has a memorable melody.

This topic was briefly discussed by the "Inside the Score" series:

Aside from this I think it would also have to be fun or entertaining or something along those lines. The idea of too much seriousness in classical music has also been played out to great extent around here and elsewhere. Its growing seriousness rather coincided with its disappearance in popular culture.

 

What do you think would have to happen for classical music to become relevant to the people again?

I think for new classical music to become mainstream relevant the first thing is there would have to be a return of melody, a musical form that has been increasingly discarded by many forms of music including a lot of popular music and a lot of film music.

Think of any song or tune or piece of music that is dear to you, that you know from memory and hum to yourself, and see if it has a memorable melody.

This topic was briefly discussed by the "Inside the Score" series:

If film music has 'discarded melody' (I don't think it has), does it matter? Film music is written for a specific purpose, and its incidental nature relates to the images, emotions and events on screen. I'm very happy that such music doesn't necessarily focus on melody for its effect.

 

The most popular film composer of our time, John Williams, is so embedded in popular culture his music played at halftime of my local school's football games and by my local professional orchestra. Film music may not be classical music but it is closer to it and an easier pathway to it than popular music.

Williams music relies on melody, arc, sonata and other traditional forms -- the reason for his popularity. Themes like those from Superman and Star Wars are well-known by young people because the music has stayed alive in popular culture the past 40 years unlike almost everything written by classical music composers the past 40 years.

Had classical music itself not abandoned these forms it too would have a greater following...instead of the decline that has occurred.

 

So, as exemplified by John Williams, film music hasn't abandoned melody.

 

Why do you want Classical music to be more popular? Usually the more popular music becomes the more compromised it is artistically. If your standard is John Williams, that is not an improvement or even a continuation on Shostakovich, but a retreat to populism.

IMO, I prefer having Classical music remain a niche preoccupation, but with the artistic quality intact.

 

Classical music may enjoy a brief resurgence in sociaty in the future but it is the nature of life to move on, to progress.

It will become more and more niche.

 

So, as exemplified by John Williams, film music hasn't abandoned melody.

Is like saying classical music hasn't abandoned it because Bach or Mozart use melody.

 

No, it's like saying classical music hasn't abandoned melody, as exemplified by Eric Whitacre.

("Bach and Mozart" - I had no idea John Williams was so old!)

 

This question has been asked and answered endlessly and there's not much to add. Classical music has become a niche product. There's nothing wrong with that. There will always be those few of us who really get into it, who really value it and recognize how powerful and thrilling great music can be. But to survive, it must change and do it quickly. Performers must break down the barriers that they created so that so many people think it's only for the wealthy elites.

 

Performers must break down the barriers that they created so that so many people think it's only for the wealthy elites.

It's strange, because it seems like now, the wealthy elites are into pop and rock music, maybe a little hip hop. Am I missing something?

 

There has been a lot written about the "fall" of classical music and what must be done to resurrect it. I'm not sure anyone knows what changes or actions would increase the popularity. I think there so much competition from so many sources these days that a significant increase may be asking too much. Having said that, classical music may only be seriously listened to by a small percentage of the population, but the absolute numbers are still large.

 

Classical music is not even intended to be popular. It will never be popular, even in Alma Deutscher leads a tonal revolution.

 

A tonal revolution? This absolutely one of the most ridiculous statements I've read on this forum. Tonal music NEVER died.

 

I voted no, but I think that it could be. In my opinion we in classical music urgently need that one composer who catalyses popular attention by making a step forward of his contemporaries in terms of artistic achievement. I see no Monteverdi, no Bach, no Mozart, no Beethoven, no Wagner and no Stravinsky in the nowadays' generation of composers. To me, it is as if the death of Shostakovich created a great vacuum and now we only have the Meyerbeers, the Spohrs, the Porporas and the Dittersdorfs of our days making classical music, or at least getting fame from it.

 

now we only have the Meyerbeers, the Spohrs, the Porporas and the Dittersdorfs of our days making classical music, or at least getting fame from it.

One would wish for at least a new Mussorgsky

 

No it won't.

Rap will be more popular than that.

 

I know I'm in the minority, but I personally don't care if it's popular or not. I grew up being the only young person around who was actually interested in it. I knew other people my age who played instruments, but even they didn't seem to be that interested in listening to it (and many simply wrote it off as "study music"). But it made me unique and oddly enough, it always seemed to impress people when I expressed my interest in it.

I would like to see an ongoing appreciation for classical music. I do not want to see symphony halls shutter and I am always encouraged by young people playing it and appreciating it. But I don't need or even want it to have the popularity of Top 40 radio music.

 

Since the beginning of the 20th century, classical music has been increasingly displaced by popular music. This development is still going on, even the Internet could not counteract it.

People sometimes argue that classical music cannot appeal to most people because it's too complex or esoteric, but when you look at the past, this isn't true at all. In the 19th century much of classical music was very popular with the people. Just think about Beethoven: His funeral was a huge event that was attended by thousands of people, even the schools in Vienna were closed for it! Liszt was also treated like a pop star. So this music definitely has the potential for mass appeal.

So can you imagine that classical music will become as popular again as it was in the 19th century?

What do you think would need to happen for classical music to become relevant to the people again?

Your questions are based on a series of premises I do not agree with or think are supported by the historical record. But leaving all of that aside, I would say that classical music enjoyed a (relative) boom in popularity, in the US anyway, from roughly the 1920s through the 1960s. I think one thing that fueled this boom was the proliferation of the phonograph and broadcast radio. Suddenly, the symphony and opera, formerly available only to the wealthy elite in large urban centers except in the form of simple piano transcriptions that could be played in the home, became widely available at low cost to everyone, whether in a farmhouse or a cramped tenement apartment.

Ultimately, the rise of television brought so many new and different forms of entertainment to the masses, classical music increasingly got pushed further into the background. At the same time, the rise of electrical amplification completely changed western musical styles and tastes. Traditional 18th, 19th and early 20th century European classical music became virtually the last musical genre where hundreds or even thousands of people go to a concert hall to listen to unamplified singing and unamplified acoustic instruments. As Zubin Mehta once said, it survives as a museum, where a long and proud, but now past, historical cultural heritage is on full display.

So, my answer to your question would be, yes, "classical" music in the sense of serious art music intended to have lasting significance continues and will continue, and sometimes will even draw large audiences. But classical music in the sense of the European traditions of the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries, of Bach, Beethoven, Liszt and Stravinsky, is done and gone forever, though its influence remains, much as Shakespeare's influence on English language, poetry and literature remains.

 

So, my answer to your question would be, yes, "classical" music in the sense of serious art music intended to have lasting significance continues and will continue, and sometimes will even draw large audiences.

Can you give examples of such music, that draws large audiences?

 

We have been down this road many times over the past fifteen years and in the end the discussions proved nothing.

One would really have to dumb down classical if they wanted it to compete with current popular music.

Even rock from the 1970's would have trouble competing with Katy Perry and Justin Bieber.

 

One would really have to dumb down classical if they wanted it to compete with current popular music.

:lol: If I made a comment like that I'd get a slap on the wrist for trolling and negativity. Not to mention several indignant rebukes. "Can you prove that pop music is 'dumb'? What's 'dumb'? How can you compare apples and walnuts? Isn't that an elitist thing to say? Pop music today requires every bit as much intelligence and skill to produce as any other kind of music in music history. Are you saying the Art of Fugue is somehow 'superior' to Korean court music, Chinese opera or the gamelan? For shame. Can you find even one post where someone ever said pop music was 'more intelligent way back when'? I'll be waiting. Can you prove empirically that 60s Motown is 'better' and somehow less 'dumb' (whatever that means)?"... And on and on.

 

I didn't vote, because I think that the question is largely academic.

The circumstances that Beethoven, Liszt and others lived under where vastly different to today. Obviously, there was no internet. The concert hall, a product of the industrial revolution, was a major part of opening up music to a new audience, the bourgeoisie.

The piece for which Beethoven was most famous for was his early Septet. Apart from the transcriptions, Liszt hardly played his own music in public. After his retirement as a pianist, he did conduct his own music at Weimar, as well as that of others like Berlioz and Wagner. Comparatively few people would have heard his music even there.

These two cases illustrate how I see popularity as just being the tip of the iceberg, even for composers as famous as they were. How many just knew them by name? How many had actually heard their music? How many owned their scores? The numbers get less and less as you go along.

This still exists today, and not only with regards to classical. However, digital technology means that in terms of absolute numbers, more people listen to more pieces of classical music than ever before. Even if we were to add up all the audiences of all the most popular classical musicians of the 19th century, the number would pale compared to the amount of people who access their music via digital means today.

Classical music won’t be popular in the same way, but that would only be a problem if we where back in the 19th century. The whole nature of music dissemination and consumption has changed. It doesn’t mean we have to dismiss the achievements of the past. The concert hall still exists, as does the railway. They’ve been joined by other changes and innovations, which means that we are the luckier for being able to enjoy the riches of the past as well as those of the present.

 

Apart from the transcriptions, Liszt hardly played his own music in public.

Any source for that?

 

it's art music, and a music that cares for art and quality produces in time things that are increasingly sophisticated and complex, and sophisticated and complex things tend to have less and less popularit. So it's hard for something like this to also remain popular. I guess that's what "You can't have your cake and eat it" means.

But I don't exclude that certain particular performers could have a certain degree of popularity, after all there are guys like Andre Rieu, Ludovico Einaudi, Giovanni Allevi that are indeed popular. The question is what is the artistic quality of their music.

 

it's art music, and a music that cares for art and quality produces in time things that are increasingly sophisticated and complex, and sophisticated and complex things tend to have less and less popularit. So it's hard for something like this to also remain popular. I guess that's what "You can't have your cake and eat it" means.

But as I've shown in the OP, complex and sophisticated music actually WAS popular in the 19th century. So I don't think that complexity explains the musics vanishing appeal.

 

As some have noted, the question is fallacious. Though perhaps respected in earlier times, art music has never been wholly popular with the masses. It remains a niche product to this day and that’s perfectly fine by me. Besides, what would we have to complain about on TC if not for the detumescent state of popular music? Good music needs terrible music as much as the rich need the poor—one cannot exist without the other.

 

As some have noted, the question is fallacious. Though perhaps respected in earlier times, art music has never been wholly popular with the masses. It remains a niche product to this day and that's perfectly fine by me. Besides, what would we have to complain about on TC if not for the detumescent state of popular music? Good music needs terrible music as much as the rich need the poor-one cannot exist without the other.

Very elitist comment. The rich need the poor? No wonder the workers rose up!

 

I just wanted to point out, this is a poll, and the 2 out of 20 who voted yes are probably quantum physicists.

 

I voted yes, because classical music was never popular, and it isn't popular now either. Mission accomplished!

 

I'm not so sure, that classical music was never popular.

Here is a quote by eminent music historian Richard Taruskin, who actually suggests that classical music used to be popular with college students and record collectors:

"When "High Fidelity" magazine begun, which was in the 1940s, there were whole lot of magazines for collectors. It was all classical music and there were several magazines like that - there was a "High Fidelity", "Stereo Review", "The American Record Guide", and there still are a couple in Britain - "The Gramophone" for example. It was taken for granted that serious record collectors were collecting classical music but in the 1980s (I should say late 1970s, 1980s) there was an enormous change in consumption patterns for music. Things actually begun to change in the 1960s. This is something that sociologists studied. People who used to give up listening to popular music for classical music or jazz when they went to college (because those were grown up kinds of music) - stopped doing that . It goes back to the time of The Beatles, The Rolling Stones. It became intellectually respectable to listen to popular music in 1960s. So the effect of it was that the magazines that had been formed devoted to classical music now had to share space with popular music."

 

Conversation nowadays if you mention Classical on the streets:

"Bro! The concert was trippin"
"Concert. Do you guys like any Beethoven?" ... ... "Brahms?"
"Nah I don't play Pokemon Go."

 

1. The absolute popularity of classical music was never higher then now. The reason is better availability because of discs and the internet. And also much more people live today than in previous centuries.

2. The relative popularity of classical music is lower today. Popular music has benefited more from modern technical developments and changes in society. But as part of popular culture (like in films and in video games) classical music can be popular today too. It is more a specific problem of concert music and especially of atonal music.

3. Popular culture will decline when it's social foundations fail. I expect a collapse of society before the year 2100. Reasons are: Climate change, Overaging, Overpopulation, Migration, the decline of intellect, and possibly also a lack of raw materials and nuclear wars if it goes really bad. Things will change drastically and there will be no room for todays way of life. This will hit all kinds of art but probably especially todays art. But there will be more important things to worry about than classical music.

 

Wow. This discussion has so many twists and turns, from film scores, John Williams, technology, distribution, competing music genres, culture development . . .

Classical Music has been popular, and will continue on being popular. Does everyone like it? Of course not; not everyone likes bell peppers, yet they continue to be popular.

 

Wow. This discussion has so many twists and turns, from film scores, John Williams, technology, distribution, competing music genres, culture development . . .

Classical Music has been popular, and will continue on being popular. Does everyone like it? Of course not; not everyone likes bell peppers, yet they continue to be popular.

I think that when Chipia says popular he means like the same piece listened by billions of people. Or even if it's not at Despacito/Gangnam style level of popularity, something that is known by a large part of the population. Classical music, especially aside the famous warhorses, is a very niche genre with a very limited appeal especially to the young generations.

 

As for the poll, I voted "No". Classical music will never be loved by the masses and it shouldn't be. I'm thinking here of a Schoenberg quote: "If it is art, it is not for all, and if it is for all, it is not art."

 

The idea gets thrown around sometimes that classical music is a dinosaur that's stuck around far too long and is waiting to die off. I disagree. I think CM is going to be around for the long haul because of the insitutions of conservatories and the industru instelf, which creates a lot of comptetition between musicians and composers to get to the top. I think people just like being good at their instruments too much and if prestige is there to be attained, people are always going to clamor for it.

Thats why I dont think CM in and of itself will die off, but a love and appreciation of deeper repretoire. If the piece's aren't suited to displaying virtuosic skills or aren't already cemented as staples in the repretoire, it'll go to the wayside. Maybe that's just me being overly cynical but I have a gut feeling I'm right.

 

Even though I disagree with you, I liked your post, as it was intelligent and reasonable, and you included legitimate factual support. The reason I disagree is that even though technical virtuosity is an important and fundamental element of a wide variety of musical genres, classical and not, western and not, modern and not, it is not and never will be the only important and fundamental element. Also, conservatories (note the word "conserve", as in maintaining and preserving old musical traditions), and the commercial music industry as a whole, don't control the basic long-term trends. Eventually, mavericks come along who depart from the norm, attract the audience, and, painfully slow as it may sometimes seem, force everyone to adopt new paradigms.