People have been saying this for generations. Cheap seats to the symphony or opera cost less than the cheapest high end pop concert. And btw classical musicians do tour. Soloists do nothing but tour. Big orchestras tour as well.
I think she was emphasizing, that they used to tour with their own original music. Pop artistst tour to spread their own music. Orchestras don't need to tour, as the music is avaible everywhere. You don't need the Sydney Symphony Orchestra in Berlin to perform Beethoven. But you do need "Taylor Swift" in Berlin to perform her music. Soloists tour, but the "only" thing they provide is old concertos (which I love, but let's face it, it's old!)
@@jameshaydn3341 a great orchestra/conductor provides their own unique interpretation of standard repertoire. Not to mention that they often play obscure music people hadn’t heard or even commission new music.
As a musician new music needs to make me feel like I'm not just pulling out the Abhans and drilling exercises. Recently played at an National Brass band competition and the set piece we had to play felt just like that. Even though it was a brand new composition
@@magiclover9346 I think your comment "As a musician" emphasises what this debate is really about. Musicians are dissatisfied with classical music if it doesn't give them a chance for a remunerative career with reasonable working conditions and/or a chance of self-actualisation. And to be fair it won't for most people. Cait Frizzel is making her comments following a vocal accident. An ungenerous person, like myself, might say her sentiment of "Classical Music Is Dying" is an example of sour grapes. As a consumer/listener I don't see it this way. I have more than enough classical music which I can listen to cheaply at any time and more than enough for the future if I want to expand my habits. So if you consider yourself a musician think about the art form from the point of view of the millions of little people. An art form isn't worthwhile if its not listened to and I'm not bothered if musicians feel there is nothing in it for them.
What irritates me the most when it comes to Opera or Ballet is the modernization of librettos for them making them unenjoyable for younger and older audiences. How can I enjoy a fairy tale like The Magic Flute when everything is black and white and moody. Or putting Boris Godunov's plot in the middle of WW2 for artistic effect. It's simply annoying and very frustrating.
I think modern audiences are very tolerant of period pieces (or even passionate about them!) in other media such as TV and movies. If there were any reason to place Downton Abbey--or worse yet, the Lord of the Rings--in a setting that looks like the 21st century, then I might be more inclined to believe that there's a reason to modernize something like the Magic Flute. (As for vocal style, however, is it possible that the classical vocal style is a compromise between the need to sing beautifully and the need to make one's self heard over an orchestra without a microphone? Because that compromise may just be obsolete at this point.)
I am primarily an opera composer. I want my operas set in the periods I set them. Period. This kind of silly crap kills the dramas. It's pretentious and plays intot he whole "elitism" argument. "Oh we are just SO BORED with Carmen. Let's set it in outer space and have a 6'4" countertenor with a beard play her. And while we're at it let's set the whole thing in a bowling alley in the 1950s." Barf. The music is married to the drama in opera or ballet, just as it is in film score or even video games. It has to make sense in dramatic context. The setting is part of what makes an opera effective. Those "modernized" staging ruin the artform.
Its a common pattern, seen in Disney films too, alienate an existing audience to appeal to a different "modern" audience which may or may not exist. Unfortunately all you can do is not bother to go anymore which is sad for everybody. But hey the self-actualisation of the producers and cast is way more important than the audience.
So true! It's like a double whamy.. not only has the appeal of opera been lost to many, but the specific appeal that makes opera opera, opera is voluntarily giving up 😂. So that's a loss of not only the people who would lose interest no matter what you do (due to cultural shifts, etc.), but also the fans who are disappointed and even subconsciously don't see the point of going anymore. The visuals have degraded, the singing has degraded, so what do you go for.. to hear the orchestra?? That will eventually feel like a rip-off to most. The human soul craves beauty. But they're giving us a counterfeit - ugliness, an imposter we have to accept in its place
Classical music is just music. I think the problem starts with seeing it strictly as a genre and therefore a niche. My training was in ballet, so I certainly heard a lot of classical music in the studio. But it was also still very present in TV ads, cartoons, films, restaurants, elevators, etc. Even pop music was objectively more melodic. All of this helped to cultivate the ears of everyone, not just die-hard aficionados and snobs. I think the problem is truly humongous because we are entering into a largely unmusical era. When artificial sounds that don't have anything to do with real instruments or the human voice have taken over to such an extent, then all forms of music will sound foreign to younger people. To answer your question from the beginning: is classical music worth saving? Yes. Absolutely. It is a good in our world and a good is by definition worth saving.
To survive, classical music has to be advertized at least with the same intensity as the modern music is. Once you form the taste of the children they will like it. So, easy. So, schools, TV, Radio, .... all that should be full of classical music. Those are the 'taste forming institutions'. The question is: Why these institutions do not do that?
Very good question...I mean if . modern day patrons are going to commission new works and concerts, why not promote these people and events??? It's like she said in the video, maybe they just don't want 15 year girls on Tik Tok during Rachmaninoff and so they keep it elite on purpose...we need a new system of patronage devoted to living composers and the recently deceased
Bugs Bunny cartoons really helped boomers and Gen X get exposed to classical music. Fact of the matter is that people will like classical music if it's presented in a way that's fun and engaging. I think one of the big problems is the very academic-focused and high brow culture that accompanies classical music. It's difficult for the average joe to get into and when people try, they are sneered at by the hipsters because they happen to like Canon in D or 'The Four Seasons' as opposed to Pierrot Lunaire by Shoenberg.
to survive classical music has to die stop playing brahms and rahcmaninov over ansd over because this music is outdated and overplayed start to play modern/contemporary regularly and see what happens
I'm just a middle-class schlub who loves listening to Beethoven, Brahms, and Tchaikovsky symphonies and concertos over and over again, including sometimes in person. I'm okay if movie and video game music gets thrown in the mix, as long as it's not atonal. I hope "the system" doesn't ultimately take this away.
Re "I hope "the system" doesn't ultimately take this away". They are working on it. You look like a white man! This means all the hobbies, films and music you enjoy must be replaced by the message.
Wow imagine like there was this magical thing called "music", something that has enough subtlety, nuance, complexity, that it allows for many perspectives, many interpretations, many feelings. Imagine an artistic manifestation that isn't just a disposable consumer product. What a wonderful thing that would be. 04:50 Why do you judge classical pieces by the same standards than four chords repeated over three minutes with some rhymed tropes overlayed? Why do you willfully ignore the idea of interpretation?
I majored in composition. The HUGE problem in the academic world is the emphasis on atonal music. Audiences do not want to hear it. Composers are encouraged to emulate Schoenberg, Webern, and Berg, instead of Hayden, Mozart, and Beethoven.
Atonal is absolute suicide if classical music wants to survive lol I can’t stand it. It’s so bad .. I put it next to death screamo metal on my personal list of music I really dislike lol
@@PeaceNinja007 does nikos skalkottas count as an atonal composer? i think his music is pretty good and definitely tolerable to the average person in the street
0.39 - I have never heard a single classical musician say this. Maybe the labels, but certainly not the musicians. Those few musicians that do say this don't get hired back after a little while. 2:28 - I really don't know what albums you're listening to. What albums sound muddy? Those volume changes might be the dynamic changes that are written in the music. I seriously doubt the producer is going ham at the controls and playing with the levels... 3:27 - "We want stereo sound!" Yes, as opposed to the mono sound that classical albums use....except they are also recorded in stereo sound. Mono hasn't been around for sometime now. I find it funny where she mentions the soundproof studio booth because I'm trying to imagine the logistical challenges with recording an ensemble. What do you do? Book the studio for a few years and give each musician a change to record their parts without letting them listen to their peers play with them? 3:45 - Really? Seriously? Apparently classical musicians are so stuck in the past that we haven't figured out the magic that is...anything greater than 1080p video quality. 4:40 - "It's never original music." David Bruce would like to have a word with you. While I do admit that contemporary music in the classical sphere does not get the coverage it sorely deserves, it's a bit foolish to say that "It doesn't exist." 7:05 - The practice of performing older composers works instead of primarily focusing on contemporary composers occurred earlier than that. Even when this happened though, there was still an emphasis on new music that doesn't exist today. Composers that had multiple works successfully premiere after 1900: Debussy, Ravel, Stravinsky, Copeland, Bernstein, Ives. Contemporary music has had less focus, but it's not just because older music is performed. 7:45 - There you go again pretending contemporary classical music doesn't exist. 10:00 - Ensembles do tours. They may not be as frequent as pop artists, but they do exist. The pay scale of a musician varies greatly depending on where you look. Musicians in one of the big 5 might have a six figure salary (w/ the conductor making way too much money), but there are a variety of regional orchestras where the musicians make a fraction of that sum. Every ensemble is different and has a different financial situation. They're not one in the same here. 10:40 - This...really depends on where you're going to concerts. A ticket to the MET Opera will attract a different audience than that of your local symphony orchestra. 12:26 - Ownership model? You realize pop artists are owned by record companies with rich CEOs right? Also, a ticket to a symphony orchestra concert will often be cheaper than a ticket to any artist in the top 10 right now. I challenge you to look up your local symphony or other classical ensemble and check ticket prices. If it was truly only "For the elite", then the prices would at least match what Ariana Grande charges right? As a side note, your sources are very odd. The first source is from 2021 and it a short blog post that is filled with conjecture. It makes the case that classical music is dying because of a few UT performances that didn't have large audiences (during a pandemic) and because of when it was written, it couldn't use any sources from a year later that show a little more positive outlook on classical music. The next two sources are a decade old and the final one is a Classic FM article that makes the case that classical music dying is hyperbole due to something new apparently killing it sprouting up every few years or so.
Don't get me wrong. I understand what this video is attempting to do. It's just makes so many wrong assumptions about classical music as it has existed, and currently exists, that the video seems completely pointless. For example, blaming the performance of dead composers music seems weird when you take into account that this has been the case since Felix Mendelssohn conducted the Gewandhaus Orchestra in the 1830s. The last time I checked, there were a lot of composers after 1830 that were successful in their careers (The big 5 in Russia, Tchaikovsky, Stravinsky, Debussy, Ravel, Copeland, Bernstein, and too many more to list here).
"Composers that had multiple works successfully premiere after 1900: Debussy, Ravel, Stravinsky, Copeland, Bernstein, Ives. Contemporary music has had less focus, but it's not just because older music is performed. " And you forgot to mention RACHMANINOFF!!! His piano concertos are gorgeous and have become a sort of rite of passage for every concert pianist. Not to mention LOTS of vocal choral and solo music! And of course Prokofiev too. It's almost hard to believe, in fact, that they didn't exist before that. 😂. Of course a lot has happened culturally since then, and i wouldn't say it's for the best, but we have yet to see what the 21st century will produce none the less. But of course the really great ones don't come except in handfuls per century, so perhaps people look too hard to find something special in every musician that writes a line of music the least bit known, getting all worked up that we're only paying 'old ones'. That never happened centuries ago and all the more so we shouldn't expect it now either. Great composers are great because they're rare and exceptional, and that will always be the case. 90% are always forgotten in a few decades. Nothing new, and that's normal.
Hear me: Anime and Video game orchestras are and will thrive even more in the future. Because story is KING. And this is the relatability to the audience. Also some of the best music I have heard comes from these and the meaning*** behind it due to the story and characters. I have discovered some of my favourite composers of all time because of them. Some scores are better than the animation itself and even the story. Keep an eye out for this.
Well said...and I love your optimistic outlook in this direction...if more living composers, who may not be writing for Anime or video games, could think more about STORY...they would be more successful too (new relevant operas, ballet scenes, symphonic poems, etc) today's audiences need guidance in this way, you're absolutely right!!!
You really have no clue. All of this is being done on purpose by bad actors. They want to tear down the foundations of society. It's called the fifth column.
I think you are barking up the wrong tree. Classical music lovers like music not because it is ""relevant" but because it is beautiful, because it gives pleasure, and it continues ro do so after hundreds of years. Unfortunately, I really don't know how you get people to experience this pleasure. In my own case, when I was 15 my best friend became enamored of it, so I gave it a try and was smitten. Now, 77 years later, it still gives me intense pleasure, whether trough headphones on TH-cam or in person at the concert hall; and I am still happiest seeing the Marriage of Figaro yet again in a traditional performance that does not attempt to be "relevant!"
She doesn't know how to distinguish great music from good music. The reason the music of masters such as Beethoven and Mozart is still around up to this day is because it is music that has stood the test of time. Her knowledge and experience of Western art music may be so limited that's why she thinks this way about Western art music.
@@PM_ME_MESSIAEN_PICS I think that people who enjoyed Figaro at the time didn't do so primarily because of its "relevance." After all, the primary audience did not consist of the oppressed masses.But that's just my opinion; and there are many operas that never had any "relevance," yet have remained popular over the centuries.
@@yon8378 could it then be that other forms of music that are more relevant than opera became more popular? but I will have to agree with what you said
@@PM_ME_MESSIAEN_PICS Basically I dislike thhe word "relevant." Relevant to what? I believe that the only legitimate role of art is to give pleasure. If it does so it has fulfilled its purpose.
I love a melody, a tune. I've listened to new composers works and the ones I've listened to seem anti-melody. It's like they've been taught/instructed at their conservatoires that having a great melodic musical hook in their compositions is 'common' or low class, populist etc and should be avoided at all costs or they won't be taken seriously as a composer. I hope the contemporary composers have other skills because their lack of listenable music output isn't going to sustain a composing career.
This is not as true as it used to be, but still...a very good point. If you think of the more recently 'popular' composers, like John Adams, Steve Reich, Philip Glass, Arvo Part and John Luther Adams, they have absolutely brilliant ideas and textures, but even they generally avoid the 'tune', and it does seem like academia still encourages originality over listenability, even if the serial methods aren't stressed as 'the way' as much as before...but I agree, melody needs to make a serious comeback in modern classical music. Composers should try to not worry so much about their peers and start writing music that they themselves would actually want to hear...then maybe we will have a new syntax
The need to impose consumerism on everything is the problem - the heritage of over a millennium of music isn’t solved by pandering to consumers just as with Jingju, Gagaku, Shinto temples etc- I indeed do blame the “consumer” - not everything exists for your tittilation, however much the USA wishes otherwise. And no classical music is not an “industry”. It’s centuries of our history. And another very important point is that the view that Western classical music is dying is quite parochial as it’s growing like crazy in China, compared to which the USA is barely a blip.
The symphony orchestra for the region i live in recently performed "die zauberflöte" for a family audience, which was in Danish instead of German and with an introduction to the story before. Ticket prices were an absolute steal too at, like, 13€ for adults and 6€ for children. The hall was packed to the brim with families with children and elders alike. So I think this might be one way to go. It somewhat keeps the musical integrity in my opinion, while also being friendly towards new listeners.
That is something I see as a solution. The modernization to the max of classical music is something I don't like. Imagine going to a classical concert and seeing blinding lights and a see of fog. That is just distracting and takes away form the performance itself
Interesting video but I think a lot of the points were iffy. The most problematic point though is the comparison of classical to bruno mars and other artists all doing the same elvis cover over and over. You stated this yourself correctly with the nutcracker example: this is not about the musicians, its about the composer or piece itself. The fact that there are multiple different performances of something just makes it more accessible rather than redundant as your point implies. Also the fact that orchestral works get replayed isnt really an issue either because since classical has existed for so long, its not really starved for content, there are so many incredible works that rarely get played, in a given year its very hard to find a single performance in the US for say Bruckner 1 for instance. Ive listened to so much classical and it would still take the rest of my life to continue to uncover still such a small part of it. The biggest issue is that when people think about classical music they think about the most cliche and boring pieces, and when its "made modern", its just the boring stuff rehashed in a slightly more modern way, yet ultimately still cliche and overplayed. Everybody and their mothers know a grand total of 4 notes from Beethoven 5, but what about the rest? Pomp and circumstance, played at graduations, has an amazing second theme that nobody knows because the first part is played on a loop. Bach Toccatta and Fugue, same thing, the media just covers the opening 5 seconds of it. People would like classical music if it were given the spotlight and attention on the world stage. We dont need something new, because already nobody knows Shostakovich or Bruckner or Mahler or Prokofiev (and soooo many more I could keep listing). The work these legends have produced are some of the most beautiful, epic, grandiose, powerful, and absolutely mind blowing earth shattering music to exist, but they are vastly unknown to the general public. The concert halls do their job of programming it, but people dont go because they dont give it a chance. In their minds they have already associated classical with some trivial early classical baroque style of music when really its so much more. That is the problem. Making something "new" where somebody is just rehashing Vivaldi 4 seasons (which is funnily enough the bruno mars example) is not going to fix this.
In education, in the UK at least, 'classical' music is considered only one of many 'world' musics (sic) (and sick). Joe Soap and his mates are made to study a Shakespeare play or two, but not a Mozart symphony or, heaven forbid, a Shostakovich string quartet! Critical listening (nowadays contaminated by critical theory - not of itself, of course) is for deconstructing and destroying, not for learning, challenging and inspiring. Thanks for your excellent comment!
Excellent points! Unfortunately this state of affairs is accompanied by 'nobody cares', because music today is just a backdrop and those who control the cultural ecosystem keep it that way. Don't anybody dare stop and listen to anything complex or deep for even a minute, it might cause the 'wrong' kind of inner transformations. People don't go even to rock concerts to listen, but more to get strong sensations of a primitive nature that act as a catalyst for the rest of their lives .. made of similar substance. But more often than not music is just a superficial background phenomenon and nothing more. That has been pretty much accepted, so how are you going to convince anybody to dedicate some span of attention to 'listening'. Way too much effort.
good point! most ppl only know like two composers max and there are still so many composers that rarely even get performed at concert halls. not sure how to get more people to know about these composers though. i think early childhood music education can help though
Discussions like yours always remind me of a cartoon in the New Yorker that cracked me up: A well dressed couple is walking by a marquee announcing a Symphony program, which reads...."Now playing: Brahms Symphony Nr 1 in C minor, and Wet Tee Shirt Contest".....this is a perfect parody of what you are suggesting.......
Lovely, i think the reason audiences aren't tuning in to classical music is much more insideous ... people aren't playing music or singing themselves anymore. In the past everyone sang at church . People would play folk instruments down the pub. "Musicians" were those fancy orchestra people. But in reality most people made music themselves even if it was whistling. Not sure if you have noticed but happy birthday is not sung as confidently in the past. You can appreciate the experience of watching a sport ... yet if you have never played it yourself you don't appreciate it as much as you could. For instance watching cricket is popular here in Australia because most Australians have played backyard cricket ... yet American audiences don't get cricket because they haven't played it themselves. I'm in my forties went to church as a kid played flute in a school band and was in the choir. - classical music is accessible to me because i played Minuet in G . Did you know pop music is dying too? The streaming model is killing album sales. But i think all commercial music is dying because people have lost their ability to sing and to play music.
An important point! In the 19th and early 20th century, lots of people had pianos at home, and piano music was at its zenith because those who played the piano, if only a little, knew how to appreciate it. Later came instruments like the saxophone, and jazz became very popular. In the second half of the 20th century it was the electric guitar and rock music. Now so many youngsters don't play any musical instrument at all and therefore don't appreciate the music made with them. What consequently dominates is machine-produced pop.
That is unfortunately, absolutely true imho...a new initiative, like the old "Save the Music" is needed so bad, along with an updated approach to music appreciation to supplement a new curriculum
Still, there's something to be said about "cultural relevance". How long are current musical trends going to stay relevant, and further ahead ... what will we do when we run out of trends ? I strongly doubt anyone will remember Taylor Swift a century or two from now. That is, if music is still made by human beings by then
I started listening to symphonic metal bands like Epica and Haggard. I loved the voices and instruments, because of that I started listening to classical music and now im a huge fan of Opera. So in my case, it was metal music that made me love classical music
I went from rock and punk to Classical back in the early 1980s. I was seduced by the heaviest stuff, Wagner and Beethoven in particular. Later I went on to be an opera composer.
The overlap between classical and metal is pretty strong - most of my metal-loving friends also like classical music. Both genres stress instrumental elements (and virtuosity), high drama, and (at this point) are somewhat outside of the mainstream. And, classical music has been a big influence on metal since its formative years of bands like Deep Purple, Uriah Heep, and Scorpions.
Classical musicians have always been poor, many of the great composers barely scraped by and were not appreciated until after they died. Mozart was buried in a pauper's grave. His music didn't die. If anything, CM is much more alive and widespread now than it ever was, the music of Mozart et al. is enjoyed by far more people today than ever before. And it seems like Early Music using period instruments is continuing to grow. I'm sure composers from the Renaissance to the Romantic never imagined their music would survive this long and be appreciated all around the world. Thanks to TH-cam and IMSLP I continually discover music from previous centuries that is "new" to me.
I took over our Community Symphony last season (2022-2023) We are all amateurs. (I have my Masters in Music Education, but was a pianist and classical guitarist with a bit of musicology in my background.) We have people coming from larger cities to play with our group, because we do a variety of less difficult music from Baroque standards through 10 year old movie and tonal classical music. We also play popular standards. I think, for our audience, anyway, the length of the pieces and the length of the concert make a difference. We are now doing thematic concerts of five to seven shorter pieces from different eras in 75 to 90 minute concerts (including intermission, which includes refreshments, a nice place to sit and chat with friends, and players going out to mingle with audience members.) This season we featured Vivaldi in our March concert, and Mancini in our April concert. Tonal and tuneful and really appreciated by the musicians and the audience. Next season, I'm programing Litvinovsky and Andrew Lloyd Weber in November, and trying to get us into Helvi Leiviska for the spring. I always throw a standard classical composer into every program, too. Our musicians range in age from 15 to 75. The biggest gain in membership is the 23 to 35 year old cohort. Think about it - you can work with other people without having to be 'social' - or you can be social, if you want. You work together to reach a goal and create a thing of beauty. You are important to the final project, but if you've had a rough day, other musicians are there to support you and help you lose your problems for a couple of hours while you let your anxious brain function to make sense of a puzzle that IS solvable. You can tell your spouse, "this is my weekly scheduled time to be an adult, and it's your night to stay home with the preschooler and baby." I honestly believe the mental health benefits of recreating this complex beauty together are so relevant to society today. I know this isn't the big 'business' side of highly trained musicians going on tours and playing impossibly technical masterpieces, but I think it's where classical music always has to have a presence if it's going to survive. And - let's face it - this music will change and disappear just as all of humanity's cultural icons do. We don't know what the music of Ancient Rome or Greece really sounded like. We have descriptions, but we have not experienced it. Some day, if humanity survives, this music will fade completely, or change and become something different. That's the way of the world.
I know that some time ago in Amsterdam they held piano concerts in cafe's and bars. One of the reasons why they did that was because there were plenty of people in their 20's and 30's who were into classical, however, they didn't like going to fancy places to listen to it. I really like classical and jazz (which was even lower on that chart), but the snobby people who go to these (fancy) events really turn me off. To me, a world without these 2 genres of music being performed would be a less beautiful world, so I really hope they can reinvent themselves.
Agreed!! I'm 24 and the worst part about the concerts is the audience. Pretentious, snobby, judgy. I still go, usually alone, practice ignoring or talking back at them every single time.
Classical music is the best music we have and will never die but impossible to create something new in its garden. So, this is the reason why jazz is more actuell. Of course i love jazz as much as classical music.
3:36 is bizarre to me. Classical sounds the best in my headphones. Granted, they're somewhat expensive headphones, but still. The sound quality on a typical modern DG, Decca, Naxos, Chandos, or Pentatone release (for instance, not to exclude other great labels) is light years better than a typical pop or rock album. With respect to the rest of the thesis, it has given me food for thought but I don't know if I'm on board with the totality of it. I am a classical nut, and am not wealthy by any means. I also like pop, rock and jazz. But classical is an absolute tonic in my life, and a good 90% of my music purchasing in the last 5 years has been CM. My family and I get to perhaps 5 paid concerts a year with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and then attend a few more free concerts outdoors in Millennium Park. Between the two it seems like there is demand for the music - the venues are always packed. If it were hard for me to find live events to attend, I might be more in line with the thesis here. I do understand the critique that the majority of money is coming from wealthy patrons and serves to reify their tastes... but I share similar tastes, and hasn't it always, to some degree? Haydn was employed by either a baron or a prince for basically 50 years. I do however totally agree that the stuffiness and etiquette of the live CM experience should be loosened up.
I think it depends on *who* is in those audiences. If it’s the same people over and over again, that’s also worrying. And perhaps the repertoire? I can fully imagine that “An Evening at the Movies” might be an incredibly in-demand concert for the CSO, but perhaps Haydn would be less so. I definitely agree that there are loyal fans and shows aplenty, but the financial health of most organizations is frightening to consider. I never felt secure knowing my paycheck came from a house that was reliant on the generosity of its wealthiest audience members to stay in business. 😕
My opinion on this is that a lot of people don’t just listen to music because they like the sound. People have a lot of preconceived notions about what kind of music is meant for what kind of person. It’s a part many peoples self image and what subculture they feel they belong to and some people will only listen to the music of their subculture. This could be because they identify as a skate boarder, punk person, goth, or hip-hip aficionado. A lot of people perceive classical music as hoity-toity, uptight and for rich old people. If people just listened to what they thinks sounds good with no preconceived notions and paid attention to how it makes them feel, classical music would be extremely popular.
Kids give me hope. Having played many classical chamber concerts for outdoor events and schools, I've found lots of children are fascinated by the instruments and want to know more about them. They come up to the musicians wide-eyed after performances and ask great questions. Sometimes they'll ask "How do you turn it on?" They don't understand that acoustic instruments don't use electricity. So cute!
as a kid myself, I've never met another kid who's so fascinated with classical music in person. i love practicing music, and i love to get people into listening great music, like Rachmaninoff, Liszt, Chopin, Beethoven, Bach, Scriabin and i succeed every time. i think the problem is that people don't really explore the genre at all, but every time i help them find their taste in classical music, they just can't stop listening to it.
Modern concert band composers have figured out that people want rhythm and melody and they are producing some of the finest classical music of the past century. Frank Ticheli, Omar Thomas, John Mackey, Adam Schoenberg, and more are writing music that teenagers are falling in love with. Groups like the @DallasWinds are recording this music and making it available to everyone. If we can ride this lull out, there is hope.
@@__-fu5sethese guys also do quality work for orchestra, Ticheli especially. Orchestra music directors need to get on board that all music doesn’t have to be “challenging”. Quality music can also be enjoyable. I had a professor that referred to a lot of new music as “wrong notes and drums”. I think we are past that now, but people need to be able to make sense of it. Aubrey Bergauer’s studies show people fail to return because they didn’t know what was going on. We should do better job of telling them what they are hearing and if it may sound “challenging”, why it does so and it’s ok.
I think you're talking about "professional classical music" here. But most classical music, in terms of hours played, and listened, and sung, and acted, is amateur, and that's the stuff that gives people pleasure and, for kids, a great start in life. We're forming a (UK) group called "Campaign for Music", following the moves by the BBC to cut back on its professional groups (orchestras, choirs) and also the relentless education cutbacks in music education (ie instrumental and choral teaching) that's been going on for the past 20 years. I think things are different in different parts of Europe (and other parts of the world. China may be doing very well, for instance. Africa remains pretty untapped, I believe: at least, we don't see many classical musicians from that part of the world.) (Also consider the world of Theatre - we still do Old Plays, even if the proportion of New Plays is much higher than in Classical Music. But the world of theatre is much more flexible, so I think that part of your argument is spot on. BUT you still need classical musicians for your sound backing... and they have to learn somewhere. Which is what our campaign is about, its about maintaining a flow of money to ensure thaere's still a network of inspirational teachers, organisers, conductors etc. )
Classical music in North America was quite popular to the "common folk" well into the 70's. Why? Because you had things like the Firestone Hour, where Opera singers came on prime time TV to sing. Opera singers were on Late Night shows like Carson. Every cartoon and children's show had a classical music soundtrack. It was appreciated, marketed to, and shown to everyone. If classical music is hundreds of years old, how come in 1970 it was everywhere, and in 2020 it's nowhere? The music didn't change, the culture did. You are not incentivized to discover and study "Elite" anything anymore. Instead of being taught we must improve ourselves, learn, grow, and mature, people are being told they're perfect just the way they are, don't need no education, or refinement. If you can't be a TikToc singing star by the time you're 14 with 0 effort involved, they don't bother. Look at the Grammy winners this year. Ice Spice, Taylor Swift, Harry Styles, Cardi B. Objectively braindead, soulless music. We've failed as a culture. That's why high art is dying. We're not being taught what is good and what is not. We're not being taught to value what is good. We've failed music.
Music in general is dying, not just classical. And I care. I like music. As for "recorded sound as close to as if live - it sucks" (and all the other points about "changing volume" aka _dynamics,_ not using compressors or electronic/digital mixing & individual mic'ing etc). No, it doesn't suck. It's an acoustic performance, vs. arguably extremely artificial ones, putting things together & modifying sound arbitrarily with "modern studio production". Might as well make everything electronic, like some do. Or AI. _That's_ what sucks, and has gotten so bad that I hardly buy any music these days in the non-classical realm. Prove me wrong, lol.
What is killing the Classical Music Industry? Is the free of charge access, for the first time in history, whe need to accept that Music is free or almost free. The only way to combat piracy was let access to plataforms. That causes that the music is free for all except for institutions, musicians, etc... The platform economy is not strong enough to sustain the industry. Leting free of charge, people are not encouraged to assist to concerts, like before.
Regarding the "new stuff" there is the basic stuff everyone knows like Canon in D, Beethovens 5th and Ravel's Bolero. But there is just so so sooo much classical music that has recordings, not to mention most are far longer than most of what is pushed out now.
I studied composition and classical guitar performance in conservatory school for a decade. Earned multiple degrees in both my undergraduate and graduate years. And honestly, I ended up quitting the entire genre. I now play more rock, metal, jazz, funk, jam, and pretty avoid classical altogether. Why? Two main reasons: 1. The scene really is dying. There's therefore almost zero job opportunities in this field of classical music. And the two jobs I DID have as a teacher I lost, due to the fact that many of these schools unfortunately lost so much money in their programs recently, they couldn't find adjunct like myself after a year or so. 2. It's really not a stereotype that classical musicians are very elitist. I've experienced first hand the extreme levels of borderline narcissist personality disorder from many of these overly wealthy, yuppie prodigies, and snobby professors. It's pretty insufferable to be around those people, so honestly that was a major turning point in my genre switch.
Oh man, I’m sorry that was your experience. 😣 It sounds similar to mine too, it’s such a shame that such beautiful music has gotten wrapped up in so much nonsense. I was definitely one of those elitist musicians. If I hadn’t injured myself, god knows what kind of person I would have wound up becoming. I hope you feel more at home in your new genre work. 🙏
Opposite for me. Being Asian, ofc my parents forced Classical Piano down my throat. But during my teen years I rebelled, went all in on guitar playing rock, metal and jazz. Now, I'm in my 30s, going back to my classical roots, playing Classical Piano pieces. Sure, I never attended any conservatories, so I don't know how stuffy those people are; but I definitely find Classical music way more interesting than rock, metal or jazz.
Went to Konzerthuset Copenhagen with my 16 year old son. And guess what? He loved Ligeti and Messiaen, wasn't excited about Haydn. I think it has to do with "Hörgewohnheiten" and concert halls would be very wise to address this curiosity in more modern classical music among younger generations. And most importantly to invite people to be part of the conversation (e.g. explaining the music)
imo, classical recordings of the 90s into the 2000s were peak. the goal is to simulate the experience of sitting in a concert hall, and the reason why there is a massive industry of hi-res music and audio equipment, it compliments the genre well. i think if you want to raise your experience with listening to classical music you should probably start with your source, and then your equipment. a quality source (hi-res lossless audio, not streamed), with a quality DAC and amp paired with reference headphones (my preference; Sennheiser HD800S) helps a ton. things like dynamics, instrument separation, soundstage play a huge factor. i've been a subscriber to my local orchestra for over 15 years now and i can attest that although it's difficult to simulate the experience of sitting at a concert hall and hearing every instrument sing harmoniously in sync, getting extremely close is a possibility. the only issue is, it's not cheap.
I completely agree, but it’s such a shame that’s the case. The cost is so prohibitive for so many people. I think I’d ultimately prefer having two experiences: the recorded and the live. That might also bring us closer to the relevance of other music genres in today’s world. Instead of catering to the 1% who have the equipment, why don’t we cater to the 99% who don’t?
Well put...it is another barrier to entry to have to get all this high end equipment to fully enjoy the classical experience-like you said, it's another elitist element to contend with, that potential new listeners will turn away from So, what can we do about it though really??? Is it all about EQ, Compression, and Multitracking every single instrument and singer in a Mahler symphony to make it "punchy" enough for the kids to climb on board??? I'm not sure...I worked with a video/audio production company that recorded and filmed student orchestras and marching bands, etc...and I can personally attest that with a good orchestra in a GOOD room, the two condenser mics over the conductors head, really can produce a rich, powerful recording...especially for the homogeneous strings, but depending on that hall and the pieces performed, there are too many variables in that situation that make "room sound " just awful like you said...what about rearranging some of the orchestral seating to make a more balanced sound (in other words, in modern music, the bass register is always in stereo, but in the traditional orchestral set up, the bass is mainly to the right of the Sonic spectrum, making it a bit odd for modern ears-let alone the period being performed, etc) sorry this is so long, but what do you recommend about improving the recorded sound??? Love your video, editing, and delivery btw...especially kicking down the 4th wall for product placement LMAO!!!
@@ScoresUnstitched It's not hard to get a good pair of headphones, they are quite cheap nowadays. I would even say pop music would sound better if they were more like classical or jazz recordings.
Room sound: that's such a great point!! I've always loved piano solo (I play piano) but I also think I prefer listening to solo recordings like piano or cello partly because you can hear the rich little details of the instrument (e.g. hammer sounds of the piano). A full orchestra probably loses this detail because of what you pointed out.
This was a very insightful video!! I totally agree - people absolutely will always like classical music as it remains a unique way to very effectively tell story i.e. film scores plus the music is just good. It's the presentation that needs to be modernized. Easier said than done but with patience and inspiration I think it really can stay alive. Also amazing and fun editing!!
A very interesting point you just made with the recording thing, nowadays with commercial music we get the sound "in your face" clean and punchy, but for example, last week I was watching/listening Atmospheres by Ligeti and... it was like everybody in the concert hall had tuberculosis, they totally ruined the recording :(
I've just recently begun composing, not academically trained and entirely self taught, and trying to get started as an original composer is daunting. I don't have the skills to play the works i write, so I'm left to ask others to do so, and most musicians know the odds of money are low. And i also compose in the "archaic" styles of classical music, not modern atonal. I would argue to solve the death of classical music will take people seeing the composer differently. Most people don't take the word seriously anymore, or when they do, they expect this "greatness" like you're the second coming of Mozart. Musicians and composers will need to work together, it's not about "going solo" anymore. I think strong composing/performing pairs will be a way forward for the genre. Thanks for the video.
To say that Motzart et al were no different than pop artists today, is a stretch. There is the item of talent. Some names today are pumped up by a music industry on the basis of small kernel talent. The words legend and genius get bandied about until they are meaningless. Some years down the road it's..."I'll never forget ole whatsisname"
The fact is not that there is less good music. It's just enough. Rather, the majority of people have simply different needs in music. I think it’s quite normal that some track without much meaning or musical content gains billions in popularity compared to new classic masterpieces. Classical music has not always been in such great demand. It is worth accepting the fact that the era has already been replaced by a completely different era. We no longer wear wigs or ride in carriages. The world has changed and so the culture is changing. From this point of view, music finds a new way of expression. Now I'm talking specifically about the modern movement. On the one hand, it causes a lot of contradictions, on the other hand, it helps to understand that the past remains the past and we will not return to it again, it is lost. Still, let's be honest, today's acoustics, instruments, and performers are not at all the same as under Bach, Mozart or Chopin. Everything is constantly changing. I think Chopin might not have recognized his works after hearing them at any world competition
Well, part of it is that classical music got increasingly esoteric....overly intellectual....one elephant in the room is atonal music....the public doesn't get it....the thing is that there is a ton of underperformed, under-recorded high quality tonal classical music being written...the conundrum is the orchestras program little of it because they feel only the tried and true brings the audience in. European classical music is still very tied to the Avant Garde. I think they have to ditch the canon to some extent and get unfrozen...and speak a musical language people can understand. The marketing aspect is one key...people like Two Set Violin have the right idea. They are showing a fun side, both honoring classical tradition and poking fun at conventions and cliches. And singers like Jacob Joseph Orlinski are great exemplars of a new classical music that appeals to a new generation. He's hot, can appear shirtless in a video, sings like an angel and he's a marvelous breakdancer... but you know talent and being marketable and beautiful don't always align. The other thing is when you talk about new music, and consumption..the marketing and demand cycle is about churning out mass produced, highly synthetic studio music...most of it consists of a few basic chords...so while the music that sells millions in streaming now is relevant-- as a species it has some currency--the songs itself are relevant for about a minute. Let's look at the reality that this video overlooks. It is a testament to the music and performers (wealthy patrons too for better or worse) that music written over 2 centuries ago is still around at all. I can tell you catagorically 99.9 percent of what is relevant now will NOT be around in 50 years. Does anybody know a pop tune that was a hit from 150 years ago? Not many. There are some old traditional songs...most older songs like church hymns have institutional continuity to account for their survival including Christmas carols I do feel that adapting to streaming and music as recording is another key. People need to take music with them anywhere. The other rub is that to get a symphony orchestra together to perform and to record requires a concert all, just on sheer scale or a studio big enough to hold an orchestra....There may be something archaic about this but it's darn special. Of course with today's engineering musicians in an orchestra can record parts and assemble them in a studio...but it's still way more challenging than recording a 5 piece rock band. Which brings me to another point...there is a complexity and quality in making and performing this music that demands a lot and by and large is in its intent opposed to mass production...I used to write novels. My first one took me 7 years to write. It was just complex and took a lot of time because I have a very organic process and am not writing to formula...And I wrote it and took that time to do this without any real hope that I would ever make money...I wrote it for it's own sake...most "relevant" music today is just written to a formula that makes money...write a certain song that's like the one that was a big hit last year and you have a big hit this year...that said there are wonderful new songs being written but most of the best are not massively popular...they have smaller dedicated followings. the length of classical music is another barrier. It takes a person looking for more than a good beat, who will sit through a 30 or 40 minute composition. As I compose music and post on TH-cam...I know that it's hard to get anyone to listen beyond 2 or 3 minutes...about the length of a pop song. Can we blame this on the classical music establishment? I think not....So without turning classical music into nothing but miniatures, it would be hard to compete with the listening habits of a contemporary audience and survive on it's own terms. i.e. symphonic or operatic music. It does seem that you have to tell a story because everybody has converted to thinking in terms of tv and movies...they like move scores with a classical sound so long as they can relate to characters or story. So what then of absolute music that just exists for it's own sake? Perhaps the truth is there is not much of an audience for that simply because we live in different times with different technology and very different values about what it means to connect with music.
@@kendrickpereira37 No realize that there is a need for change. You never know when ideas and tastes come back to different values...30 years ago if you had said people would be releasing their music again on vinyl records you would said they were crazy...but I wonder if you are even old enough to remember. Composers write what they like and they do it because they can.
Thank you so much for this video! I'm a young musician who is very much in love with classical tradition, but not that one of 20th century, but of those centuries before when people composed and performed, improvised their own music. I write, improvise and perform only my music. 🥰
One of the mosts popular composers in classical music today is Rachmaninoff (his concertos and other piano music are a staple in any international competition) , and that's 20th century. Prokofiev is another one that produced amazing timeless stuff in the 20th century, there were many more. Pop music is simply a symptom of a degrading culture and yes it does steal from true art, but it will never completely win over the world.
I'm in a rustbelt city with a first class orchestra, which mostly performs canon--very well--but which with every season seems to pander more and more to the tastes of the unschooled. There are smaller ensembles here who frequently commission new pieces and premiere them and I increasingly see younger people at these performances, and they are engaged with the experience. As the first class orchestra's programs increasingly feature stuff like classical renditions of The Beatles and the music of holiday blockbusters, and the candlelight concerts you mention, I hope it succeeds in bringing new subscibers in. But I'm so glad that there are alternatives that are more challenging and fresh, because that is more likely to create lifelong classical music fans from those already accustomed to hearing classical music in video games and YT videos.
I totally agree! I definitely don't advocate for *all* classical music to swing to the other side and try to pull in new audiences. The problem is when there's very little "entry level" music being programmed at all. Balance is the name of the game, imo.
@@ScoresUnstitched: New, contemporary music would be fine... if it were pleasant to listen to. Most contemporary composers seem to have an aversion to lovely melodies and harmonies.
I play in a Baroque ensemble....and would rather perform for the 3 or 4 hundred thoughtful people who attend the concerts than the 50,000 Swifties that jam a stadium to hear that pablum....
I will also disagree with the last point. I do in fact think that the overwhelming majority do not like classical music itself as a genre, and a lot of it is, well due to reasons stated earlier in the video(electronic music, and other things). They even dislike instrumental music in general (unless it involves electric guitar, for the most part). "This has no words, this has no beat, this is boring because of that" All things I heard as a 2nd grader in the 90s when I was trying to get my friends to listen to what I liked at the time. It's such a foreign musical concept to people now, even at the earliest of ages they are colored by those biases already. They no longer get exposed to it on a consistent basis at home, or school, or in the mainstream anymore. Even most Churches(which is really the last place it has some sorta main stream exposure) have gone away from it and replaced it with guitar and drums, with lights and fog and all this other stuff to attack every sensory in the body. Classical will always have an 90 degree uphill battle if that's what it has to go up against.
Sharing a thought because of the headphones thing... don't ditch the music, ditch the headphones! On a hi-fi stereo, the intimacy and high dynamic range of the recordings create a startling realness that can be "seen" just as much as heard. Placement of instruments is easily distinguished, and the glorious spaciousness of the recording venues places you right there in the middle. The most subtle nuances of sound and movement are revealed. You won't just hear the bow move, you'll hear how they're moving it. I know that sounds mystical... it's hard to fully describe. Cheers :)
Oh my! In the first five minutes you've summed up exactly what I've been feeling deep inside for years as an performer. I wasn't even aware of it until you put it into words. Now I'll keep watching. I just had to tell you this right away.
I feel like this video would’ve HEAVILY benefited from including examples of living composers (that aren’t film composers) who do write music audiences love, and know how to navigate the space of music in the 21st century. Max Richter, Christopher Cerrone, Mason Bates, and Takashi Yoshimatsu, just to name a few. Their music is much more digestible than what people typically think of contemporary classical music. This video left out a whole world of composers who are living today and are writing classical music. And the best part about their music? It doesn’t sound like something written 200 years ago. It still sounds new, and general audiences can enjoy and understand it (unlike the music of Boulez, Fernyhough, Stockhausen, etc.). I think having modern composers write in the style of Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, etc, is definitely not the solution. It will only sound like an imitation of older styles, and therefore still not be relevant to today. Composers need to write classical music that is still new, but that audience can enjoy. And there are composers already doing that. We just need more
You are absolutely right on this point...there IS new music being written for the old acoustic ensembles (sometimes integrated with electronics) by living composers who aren't serialists and it's fantastic, but it gets no real promotion so the general public has no idea its out there!!! Besides the ones you mentioned, also definitely check out the new works by Andrew Norman, Caroline Shaw, and Saad Haddad just to name a few more...it's not about rehashing Mozart Beethoven and Tchaikovsky, but its also not about abstract incoherence either...new composers don't have any rules to follow anymore, literally ANYTHING GOES today, so you can make a concerto or tone poem that incorporates melody *gasp*, functional harmony, but with some modern extensions, a narrative or fanciful title, a hidden tone row, a brief atonal episode for contrast, all done with impressionistic harmonies in a Minimalist type texture, and there's nothing wrong with that, or anybody stopping you!!! So as living composers we must be honest and appropriate to ourselves, know that any and everything is up for grabs, and just starting writing with genuine enthusiasm again, and NO FEAR OF MELODIES!!!
Not having access to a concert hall let alone a theatre in ones local is a huge problem. I used to live in Adelaide "the city of choirs" WITHOUT A DEDICATED CONCERT HALL! Also the act of going to see a musical, opera, or a classical performance is expensive because one has to travel far to see a good enough rendition. And yes, unfortunately classical music does require listening for more than 3 minutes before the track changes.
All music is dying, simply because people aren’t interested in music as they were. With so many other entertainment fields open to people today, and fewer gatekeepers, culture both high and low is becoming less important in people’s lives. But having said that, I can say that where I I’ve classical music is thriving. There are a lot of orchestras and smaller ensembles, especially in the early music field.
Much to agree with, but.... TOO MANY GALLOPING ASSUMPTIONS! e.g., up to the 1970s music education was part of almost every public school K-12 curriculum. People can't learn to love it if they've never heard it, especially when they were kids. Also, classical music lost its life line to the popular music of its time. Classical music is e-v-o-l-v-i-n-g right before our ears. Been to a movie, a tv mini-series, How about Game of Thrones without its musical score. John Williams ain't the only one. Our problem is that we're not expanding the definition of classical music for gen-z, etc. There's plenty of good old, and good NEW classical music on Spotify & Pandora. So don't write your Requiem for classical music just yet.
Very interesting, timely....you bring up a lot of good points and have given me a lot to think about. But...classical music doesn't sound bad in headphones....Classical music sounds bad in BAD headphones. Given a good cd transport, a high-end amplified and top-of-the-line headphones the sound can be stunning.
I agree to a point! But millennials and Gen Zers (where classical music is already dead) don't need good headphones to enjoy the music they stream all the time. And that's where classical music needs to catch up. Needing fancy (read: expensive) equipment and an education about audio to enjoy something is just one more tick in the "elitist" column. 😖
@@ScoresUnstitched That's an unfixable problem to some extent though. Mostly passable audio equipment is practically free these days - my go-to earbuds are $20 (or less on sale) - but the Beatz and other poorly-designed hardware that get marketed to the masses are bad enough that they will obscure the qualities that make most classical-like music intrinsically enjoyable at all. Modernizing production and mastering and using stuff like compressors to make the music more presentable can bridge part of the gap, but hardware would need to change too.
@@Ithirahad My work earbuds are some crappy $40 ones. Eh .. they’re not that bad. But they’re blown away by my Sony M4s, and my Audio Technica 150Xs . I hope that’s not all you have ... if so .. let buy something i feel bad lol
@@PeaceNinja007 I'm pretty broke and my equipment is somewhat limited, but not THAT limited, haha. I do have AKG K240's or Audiotechnica M40x's for when it actually matters. My point is that DECENT (not good) audio stuff doesn't cost much, but it isn't marketed as hard as the overpriced garbage that literally sounds worse for something like classical music.
@@Ithirahad Ahh . . I sent that when I was at work .. I just realized I have the Audio Technica M50X .. not the M150x .. I don’t even think those exist 😂 Okay .. I was just feeling so bad thinking you only had some $20 earbuds lol
I think it was Mozart who said, (and I paraphrase with at least a bit of abandon--but not so much as to put something into his mouth that he wouldn't have said) music needs to be both original AND beautiful. By beautiful, of course, he meant something people want to listen to, will go out of their way to listen to, will PAY to listen to. Incidentally, Wolf was pretty good at putting his money where his mouth was at.
Came across this video and can totally get your points! Classical music really emphasizes the role of composers instead of performers while today's music does the exact opposite.
Old-school jazz emphasizes the role of performers, but it's nothing like today's popular music... This stuff emphasizes personalities and physical attributes of the performers rather than their ability to actually perform music, which is a situation that doesn't even lie on the scale you're describing.
If orchestras only played what the public wants to hear, in order to "stay alive", then we would experience the bizarre phenomenon of no longer having orchestras playing... classical music. There would only be soundtrack festivals (from video games, films and TV series). What defines classical music is precisely continuing to play the music of great composers. The term "classic" itself has as one of its definitions "that which is worthy of being copied, which transcends time and geographic space".
Classical music is not dying , it is only no more mainstream like many other music genre today. Classical music was never mainstream. "Classical music is dying" is same as saying "Music is dying" . Any music genre has his own group of listener, some listener groupe are smaller than other, nothing has changed. Money is a problem for all music if going live or production. Some argument are good in video (the money part) but cultural part is..... Lot of music not made to be listen in noisy environement with a smartphone, that the reason why mainstream just sound like loud trash to overlay surrounding noise. Younger people are stuked in playlist made by non culturale AI and they only listen trash made for them. Just try to learn more about music history. Who payed for music and concert halls in past and today ? For music artist and creators , making money was ever a illusion made by media. Making music is just passion, you are not payed for the many thousand Hours to learn playing or creating music.
The audience for classical music has always been predominantly older people. I'm Gen X so-called and when I was in my 20s going to concerts, it was the same. Watch concert footage from the 1940s - its the same. It is not and never will be for the masses and yes, it does take, for most, a little bit living to appreciate it. Don't be too concerned about it.
If classical music has "fallen", what did it fall off from? Was it ever more popular than today in absolute numbers? Sure, it does not compete with whatever musical genre is currently the hype, but it does not have to compete (and it will survive that genre).
Some interesting and nuanced ideas here, and thank for you setting these out. Perhaps another interesting question connected to that of relevance is that of 'where is the value?' Starting from the point of asking how our musicking and even what kind of musicking can bring value to our audiences, and then doing some musicking that brings that value. This would also tie into your point about taking the music TO the audience, but instead places the audience first and asks 'what is the value in a musical experience for you?'
Kids don't get the option to play real instruments anymore. It's all rock school drums, guitar, keyboard and vocals here in the UK. Kids don't then get to hear and play classical music which often leads to a love of all music. Where are the flautists of the future to play Syrynx. The Clarinetists to play Rhapsody in Blue, to name just two beautiful pieces destined to stay in unplayed in the future.
Can't think of many videos I've watched on TH-cam that are based on such feeble premises and salted with quite so much irrelevance and lack of insight.
First of all, I disagree that Classical music is "pretentious" (i.e. working under the pretense) in its requirement for an elevated taste & higher intellect, BECAUSE it clearly does. Let's not PRETEND that everyone can appreciate it. One needs a powerful CPU that can focus its attention & processing power on extremely complicated sonic architectures to be able to elucidate its design & appreciate its meaning. That's not being pretentious; it's just telling the truth. But music of the Common Practice Era 🤪 will never die, as long as intellectuals do not get extinct via natural selection because they'd rather read Nietzsche than get on Tinder 😅. They've been saying the same thing about Jazz also but it keeps breathing & evolving. Even Rock also seemingly had a cardiac arrest when that godawful Electro-techno-kookoo Pop (probably the only genre I couldn't stand) trend popped out in which DJs suddenly became "musicians" standing alone on stage just pushing buttons. I'm so glad it's not much of a thing anymore. But IDK if it's all just about marketing. There will always be --- like I said tongue-in-cheek up there --- an audience for the classic stuff, but it will have to evolve & incorporate the contemporary sounds, pop culture, language, issues & arts for it to truly stay relevant. And with that, we'll have to be willing to break all the true pretentious rules. I've seen a couple of the recent Met productions of brand new operas like "Champion" (by a Black composer whose name just escapes me right now) that was supposed to have Jazz elements & dealt with contemporary LGBTQ issues. It was just too damn heavy & still sounded like it conformed to the strict rules with very little Jazz music in it. The Gershwins, who were Jewish, did it so much better with "Porgy & Bess," which sounds so much more progressive & current even NOW. They should be the blueprint. But the good thing was that those newer works have supposedly increased ticket sales. But I don't think that's enough, though. I mean, you want audiences to actually get excited & flock & destroy Ticketmasters' servers a la Taylor Swift for the Met? 😝🤣 Why not incorporate Hip-hop, street dancing & current lingo into opera? Too much rule-breaking? Well, there you go with being truly pretentious now. Thank you for listening at least. P. S. For those who haven't heard it yet, check out the album "Handel's Messiah: A Soulful Celebration" that won a Grammy in the early 90s. They re-arranged Handel's oratorio into Soul/Gospel/R&B/Hip-hop songs. Kinda like what Sister Act 2 did also with Beethoven, which I think was inspired by that album. Just to give you a better idea of what I'm talking about. It doesn't have to be that unorthodox, but I do think there's a way to make new Classical pieces sound more exciting to current audiences.
Not to argue, but I have ADHD and can't focus to save my life and I still love classical music. I usually have it on the background when I'm working, and listen to the same pieces several times for them to really register in my brain. On classical music needing big brain - that depends, I think. It's such a vast repertoire that I believe anyone would find something that they would like, given enough exposure. Some pieces are easier to listen to - eg, when I was around 5, my kindergarten teacher played us a recording of Waltz of the Flowers from Nutcracker and my whole group was so obsessed with it that we would beg the teacher to play it every day for a while. If it can grab the attention of a roomful of 5-year olds, I'm sure it can appeal to most people. On the other hand, it took me a while to get into Bach, his music really started to click with me after I learned more about what makes it great, and after many listens. And even I like a piece from the get-go, I really gain a new appreciation for it onve I've learned more about the composer and the background of said piece. While it does require some additional brain work, I really think most people have the capacity to do that once they get into the music. The main problem is the lack of exposure to classical music and the stereotype that only old and boring people can enjoy it.
Also i’m just going to say that i saw three concerts this weekend: one chamber choir (quartet), one semi-pro regional choir, and the philadelphia orchestra performing mahler 3 with joyce didonato and the philly boys choir… all of these performances were almost sold out in their respective venues….. so…….
I have many classical recordings of symphonies, concertos and large scale works for chorus and orchestra. The great majority are very well recorded, including many from the '50s and '60s on Mercury Living Presence and RCA Living Stereo. They sound great on headphones.
I feel like classical music as a genre is getting inherited by video games and movie music. More and more I see orchestras and even opera singers traveling on tours for specially good BGM's. The composers tend to have a background in it too, or take a lot of inspiration from. They are very interesting to listen and the recordings are excellent
wow what an amazing video! your editing skills and production values are insane! absolutely incredible work. Thanks very much for your hard work, it's much appreciated
I think film and gaming soundtracks are the key, and it definitely needs to get away from the image of pretentiousness and gatekeeping. I'll be honest, I wasn't interested in classical music when in was twenty, I was obsessed with Oasis and other Britpop bands, but soundtracks from people like Howard Shore and John Williams helped me appreciate the genre a lot more.
It isn't dying, it's just a smaller and smaller portion of the overall music scene. I'd bet, by raw dollars, the same amount is spent on it now than 50 years ago. People say the same thing about all kinds of things. In my industry, for several years people said that tablets and phones were killing the desktop. Which was kind of true, but only kind of. In reality, desktop computing is bigger than ever and still very important, it's just a much smaller part of the overall market now.
That is exactly what I am thinking, I am trying to explore the lesser known music of earlier centuries, and there is a lot, like really really a lot, and I compose from time to time, even though in ancient style, but I am serious about it I know the need to revolutionize our repertoire, and maybe our performance
Before I respond to other points I'd just like to say that I've gone through some other videos you have and have really enjoyed your content and videos. It's always interesting to hear thoughts and view points on this subject, even if I disagree with some of it. I really appreciate the effort and thoughtfulness you've put into your videos.
Excellent Cait. Just discovered your YT site. As a product of the Royal Academy of music I’ve often asked myself why Classical musical has fallen from grace at so many levels. Whilst Rock n Roll has been my path since then I watch in awe my ‘classical’ friends continuing to pursue surely the toughest of musical careers. I find myself agreeing with your points of view wholeheartedly and commend your optimistic suggested ‘fix’. Keep up the great work !
Not true, classical music studio recordings were perfected as early as the late 1950s. People have been saying that Classical Music is dying since I was a kid in the 1960s. Ain't happened and the audience for classical music in the Far East is huge. Notice you are wearing Royal College of Music Hoodie, incidentally. Composers are different from rock artists, by the way. They were about developing music, not selling toons and touring to make millions.
I don't know whether classical music is dying or not. I just know my new found love and adoration for it is complete. I found this love in my 50s. And being able to purchase tickets at considerably ticket prices than a football enables me to sample a number of works by numerous composers. This all started by attending the opera in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Attending the opera was a childhood dream of mine. While listening to each opera i discovered a love for Puccini and Mozart. I began to realize that many of these melodies were already familiar to me because i heard them as a child in LoonetTune cartoons or perhaps as background to a commercial or in a film. Now i could place that familiar melody with a composer. I'm able to see many symphonies by using the Passport feature with a local orchestra. I pay a flat fee to attend a set number of shows throughout the season. The orchestra features more but those additional tickets i could pay for at a discounted price. In addition to the local orchestra there is a local classical chamber orchestra season. There is an opera season. There are other works featured throughout the area including Requiems. And local churches feature various works performed on the organ. Our community has a lively classical music calendar whuch is all new to me since i just moved here. Give it time. I think attendence at classical music concerts may begin to rise in the USA. Although birth rates are falling.
Mixed feelings. You make many good points - on the one hand some "contemporary classical musicians" definitely are in denial about why audiences don't listen to their stuff, writing new music in an old style is looked at in disdain by "serious" composers ("why would you want to make something that's been done ten times better before?"), and when artist X announces they are starting to record the complete Mozart sonatas (or whatever) I will roll my eyes and wonder why, since they've been recorded a zillion times before and the market for such recordings is most likely saturated. On the other hand, to someone who's never heard Debussy before it can sound about as incomprehensible as atonal music (with the exception of some of his greatest "hits") so some education/repeated exposure really can make a huge difference, trying too hard to cater to one audience can lead to losing another (and perhaps worse: being force to making stuff you didn't want to be making in the first place, losing yourself in the process). If the feedback of the audience is: "add a beat" I would not necessarily want to follow that advice even if it might result in larger sales. I see an interesting paradox as follows: real experimentation (which can be fun for its own sake, even if there's no audience for it) is easier to do as a hobbyist that doesn't need the income from the music to survive (but who probably cannot attain the level of technique or sophistication a professional might attain) than an artist who tries to survive from their art and trained for years to master all the required virtuosity but feel like they now need to "dumb down" to sell enough tickets to pay today's rent.
Can i add that yes the acoustics of a room are cool and magical but also how f-ing cool would it be to have an amplified concert? Are you telling me that if mahler had access to subwoofers he would have passed? COME ON i want to feel those double basses in my body and not be distracted by some old geezer sneezing next to me because that is louder than the music.
I guess your question about Mahler will never be answered but I think it very understandable if he did "pass" on - what was it? "sub-woofers"? It mystifies me why people like listening to an electrical reconstruction of a sound rather than to the sound itself.
Hello Cait, you're the first person to explain the exact same points I've been expressing to fellow classical musicians for a long time. In a lot of ways, I believe 'mainstream' classical music (standard symphonic classical music, opera, ballet, etc....) is already on its deathbed and has been for some time. I believe that most crossover classical music doesn't generally work because a lot of the times it's far too pandering and gimmicky and non-classical audiences can see through the act. In the same way that classical music of its time was based on the folk/pop music of its time which made it relevant, we would need a new generation of bold and daring musicians in our time to reject the status quo and make new and relevant compositions that they can perform while going on tour for more people to care. I also believe that as soon as a music genre becomes institutionalized (taught for a degree at a college), it's almost always a death sentence for said genre. You can see how Jazz is slowly dying in the same way as classical music already has, and not too far behind is Rock and Roll. To really drive the point home, will be hilarious to see the day when one can get a bachelor's degree in Hip-Hop Performance some 20+ years down the road, and wonder why Rap became a dying genre in the future. Just a prediction....would like to know what you think about all this, and thank you for your video!
This is such great food for thought, I hadn’t considered how schooling might have an effect on all this too but of course you’re right! I wonder how K-pop schools teach and if there are any differences we could learn from. 🤔
No way, I had no clue there were K-Pop schools! I really wonder how much of that works out. Can you manufacture success that lasts a lifetime? When I think of great artists of our time in popular music, I think of people who carved their own path in the industry, and those who stuck true to their vision and honed it. I doubt that can be manufactured, and it is something which one must discover on their own. What things do you believe might be different k pop schools vs conservatories?
Isn't Philip Glass such a modern composer who transcripts modern music into strict compositional form? But where does that lead him? Other instrumentalists and have you not seen are on his trails and earn their name in his shadow already. And the man is still alive (or so I hope to the second and beyond as I write this comment). And yes, it does sound more like a noisy gimmick than actual music. Sadly. I would love to hear a genuine composition based off of music from my own generation. But instead we have to deal with more Stockhausens and the likes.
Glass gets a bad rap really, but I get it...when you hear every TV commercial imitating Glassworks/MAD Rush, etc, it does start to become gimmicky...but besides his early hard-core minimalism like Music in 12 Parts...check out his 2nd, 3rd, and 8th symphonies, his 4th and 5th String Quartets, his concertos (violin especially)...and you will be moved by a genuine artist/composer who just happens to retain elements of his former Minimalist approach, now turned into modern masterworks (IMHO)
@@niemand7811 I personally don't mind Glass at all and I find his music quite brilliant. I'll say, I would count him as someone who is quite belonging to the establishment at this point. I'm thinking of people who are active and although I'm being agist, under the age of 40. When I think to the time when composers in the past were the most prolific, it generally has been in their youth....our current classical establishment doesn't generally care what young composers have to say and the opportunities to have their music played at the highest level is almost non-existent....which is tragic considering how many brilliant potential artists of classical music aren't interested because there isn't interest and money to backup the dead genre. You'll find most of our musical geniuses composing movie music, or making char topping pop tunes
Anyone seriously interested and currently listening to "classical music" can take exception (with plenty of evidence) to every point you've made. If you're only talking about dead European composers, it's a fairly moot point, anyway. But classical music to my mind covers everything from Gregorian chant to Duke Ellington. And like those two examples you can find examples of poor to superlative audio versions in a variety of media forms. You're looking at music from a marketplace standpoint, which is a poor barometer of quality or influence in the long run. Thanks, anyway.
As a composer, I definitely agree with the model of "support by music-loving customers rather than a rich elite." But, I sometimes wonder if "classical music is dying" because people like YOU, the insiders of the industry, are the ones bored by it. I know plenty of working class people who still love Beethoven and Bach, or would see an opera in period style, but here you are doing a video blog on classical music, and what do you have playing in the background? Not classical music! Maybe we need to expose more young people to listening to classical music, but not channel all music students into classical as performers, leaving the classical music business to people who actually love and are excited about the music. Not every person likes every genre of music, and that's OK - I think the key to any genre surviving is to give people enough exposure to it to decide if they like it.
I’m not a musician nor grew up with music in my home. But along the way I developed a taste for maybe not classical music but definitely symphonic music. Used to go the Hollywood Bowl 4-5 each summer in the 70’s & 80’s. It was wonderful. Moved away then came back recently. It’s still there, but back then the Philharmonic would play 5 nights with a few nights for other “stuff”. Now it’s reversed. Maybe one night out 10 is symphonies. There’s just not enough people demanding it.
A wonderful exposition! I wonder why classical literature (including Shakeare's plays, written centuries before mostclassical music) seems to be approachable by most people. I think it's because they feel there is some entry point to help them climb aboard. Challenging art 16:56 needs intrigue or initiation by a friend, or perhaps via television or even school lessons. Children are entitled to be introduced to the great artistic achievements of humans, if only to balance the tragic side.
I agree 100% with you on this...perhaps a more modern reworking of Bernstein's great Young People Concerts for the modern age would be ideal for turning the kids on to this beautiful sound world...I would say, keep Lenny's scripts and excerpts, and animate them, either using his voice (With MAESTRO...he is back in the spotlight now), or get a new classical evangelist to present Bernstein's approach (Benjamin Zander and Michael Tilson Thomas are past their prime), but someone with the energy and enthusiasm for it that is contagious is needed ASAP!!!
This is a rubbish elephant. I like ducks but I don't like elephants. Why can't elephants be more like ducks? Elephants don't have beaks, feathers or webbed feet and are way too large. 😜 Hoping that some of you will see the relevance of this comment in relation to the arguments used in this video!
You raise some good points, but as an older person I can say that I heard similar things in the 1960s about classical music dying or being dead and they didn't happen.
I use my experience of playing and singing early music (mostly medieval styles) to create new settings of ancient saga material - new music with old instruments. People who wouldn't normally go to hear a 12C harp and a classical voice hear something different at a local festival and become insterested - it's fun to do and even more fun to chat with audiences about what's involved. I'm nearly seventy and embrace new ways of working - I never liked the old ways to start with!
Something related to what you were is the lack of willingness from classical music people. I want to get into opera singing, and during research on their technmiques and stuff I alays find myself feeling that the writer is trying to look at me from over a platform or something. Like, when I was looking info for a Do in Petto, one of the articles I read was talking about how "opera and mofdern music shouldn't mix", and that "arias shouldn't be sung with modern style singing even if it's sung properly". The writer talked about how this great modern style singer sung an aria in modern style and it was "like a screech to their ears" even though it was sung superbly. I read it and immediatly thought "yep, this is why opera is dying". It makes me wonder if the writers of these sort of articles forget people in the opera sing that way, with over enphasis on things like squillo, chiaroscuro contrast, the glottal expansion and so on because back then there weren't microphones and they played this songs for large crowds of people to hear. Like, I would bet anything that, had they had mics as we do today, they would have sung in what we call "modern style singing".
I think you made a good point here...while I am no real afficiando for opera, I do enjoy the music...but that HEAVY vibrato singing style, that, like you said, was a necessity back in the day, sounds absolutely ridiculous in this day and age imho. Its the sort of thing that you make fun of when youre 4...and when youre 40! With all due respect to the craft and the years of practice and refinement it takes to master this historically informed performance style, something just shuts down in my acceptance of it...even if I can enjoy the music, the story, the sets, the premise, etc, I just would rather hear the arias and recitatives performed with a more pure tone and the vibrato used more tastefully and to better effect if kept in check...imagine a voice with the purity of a Sarah McLaughlin or Sting singing these parts, and that's what I would prefer in modern opera at least anyway...otherwise, give me Glass's Einstein on the Beach or The Who's Tommy or Pink Floyd's The Wall as opera
People have been saying this for generations. Cheap seats to the symphony or opera cost less than the cheapest high end pop concert. And btw classical musicians do tour. Soloists do nothing but tour. Big orchestras tour as well.
Yes I couldn't figure out the tour comment either. As we all know orchestras do tour.
I think she was emphasizing, that they used to tour with their own original music. Pop artistst tour to spread their own music. Orchestras don't need to tour, as the music is avaible everywhere. You don't need the Sydney Symphony Orchestra in Berlin to perform Beethoven. But you do need "Taylor Swift" in Berlin to perform her music. Soloists tour, but the "only" thing they provide is old concertos (which I love, but let's face it, it's old!)
@@jameshaydn3341 a great orchestra/conductor provides their own unique interpretation of standard repertoire. Not to mention that they often play obscure music people hadn’t heard or even commission new music.
As a musician new music needs to make me feel like I'm not just pulling out the Abhans and drilling exercises. Recently played at an National Brass band competition and the set piece we had to play felt just like that. Even though it was a brand new composition
@@magiclover9346 I think your comment "As a musician" emphasises what this debate is really about. Musicians are dissatisfied with classical music if it doesn't give them a chance for a remunerative career with reasonable working conditions and/or a chance of self-actualisation. And to be fair it won't for most people. Cait Frizzel is making her comments following a vocal accident. An ungenerous person, like myself, might say her sentiment of "Classical Music Is Dying" is an example of sour grapes. As a consumer/listener I don't see it this way. I have more than enough classical music which I can listen to cheaply at any time and more than enough for the future if I want to expand my habits. So if you consider yourself a musician think about the art form from the point of view of the millions of little people. An art form isn't worthwhile if its not listened to and I'm not bothered if musicians feel there is nothing in it for them.
What irritates me the most when it comes to Opera or Ballet is the modernization of librettos for them making them unenjoyable for younger and older audiences. How can I enjoy a fairy tale like The Magic Flute when everything is black and white and moody. Or putting Boris Godunov's plot in the middle of WW2 for artistic effect. It's simply annoying and very frustrating.
I think modern audiences are very tolerant of period pieces (or even passionate about them!) in other media such as TV and movies. If there were any reason to place Downton Abbey--or worse yet, the Lord of the Rings--in a setting that looks like the 21st century, then I might be more inclined to believe that there's a reason to modernize something like the Magic Flute. (As for vocal style, however, is it possible that the classical vocal style is a compromise between the need to sing beautifully and the need to make one's self heard over an orchestra without a microphone? Because that compromise may just be obsolete at this point.)
I am primarily an opera composer. I want my operas set in the periods I set them. Period.
This kind of silly crap kills the dramas. It's pretentious and plays intot he whole "elitism" argument.
"Oh we are just SO BORED with Carmen. Let's set it in outer space and have a 6'4" countertenor with a beard play her. And while we're at it let's set the whole thing in a bowling alley in the 1950s."
Barf.
The music is married to the drama in opera or ballet, just as it is in film score or even video games. It has to make sense in dramatic context. The setting is part of what makes an opera effective. Those "modernized" staging ruin the artform.
Its a common pattern, seen in Disney films too, alienate an existing audience to appeal to a different "modern" audience which may or may not exist. Unfortunately all you can do is not bother to go anymore which is sad for everybody. But hey the self-actualisation of the producers and cast is way more important than the audience.
So true! It's like a double whamy.. not only has the appeal of opera been lost to many, but the specific appeal that makes opera opera, opera is voluntarily giving up 😂. So that's a loss of not only the people who would lose interest no matter what you do (due to cultural shifts, etc.), but also the fans who are disappointed and even subconsciously don't see the point of going anymore. The visuals have degraded, the singing has degraded, so what do you go for.. to hear the orchestra?? That will eventually feel like a rip-off to most. The human soul craves beauty. But they're giving us a counterfeit - ugliness, an imposter we have to accept in its place
Classical music is just music. I think the problem starts with seeing it strictly as a genre and therefore a niche. My training was in ballet, so I certainly heard a lot of classical music in the studio. But it was also still very present in TV ads, cartoons, films, restaurants, elevators, etc. Even pop music was objectively more melodic. All of this helped to cultivate the ears of everyone, not just die-hard aficionados and snobs. I think the problem is truly humongous because we are entering into a largely unmusical era. When artificial sounds that don't have anything to do with real instruments or the human voice have taken over to such an extent, then all forms of music will sound foreign to younger people. To answer your question from the beginning: is classical music worth saving? Yes. Absolutely. It is a good in our world and a good is by definition worth saving.
To survive, classical music has to be advertized at least with the same intensity as the modern music is. Once you form the taste of the children they will like it. So, easy. So, schools, TV, Radio, .... all that should be full of classical music. Those are the 'taste forming institutions'. The question is: Why these institutions do not do that?
Very good question...I mean if .
modern day patrons are going to commission new works and concerts, why not promote these people and events??? It's like she said in the video, maybe they just don't want 15 year girls on Tik Tok during Rachmaninoff and so they keep it elite on purpose...we need a new system of patronage devoted to living composers and the recently deceased
Bugs Bunny cartoons really helped boomers and Gen X get exposed to classical music. Fact of the matter is that people will like classical music if it's presented in a way that's fun and engaging. I think one of the big problems is the very academic-focused and high brow culture that accompanies classical music. It's difficult for the average joe to get into and when people try, they are sneered at by the hipsters because they happen to like Canon in D or 'The Four Seasons' as opposed to Pierrot Lunaire by Shoenberg.
to survive classical music has to die
stop playing brahms and rahcmaninov over ansd over because this music is outdated and overplayed
start to play modern/contemporary regularly and see what happens
Its always strange hearing about this "forming taste" thing, when your own taste is totally adaptable and youre open for everything.
@@eeurr1306 Not so sure that everyone is open for everything. I am not. My taste has been formed by the society, microsociety, and my education.
I'm just a middle-class schlub who loves listening to Beethoven, Brahms, and Tchaikovsky symphonies and concertos over and over again, including sometimes in person. I'm okay if movie and video game music gets thrown in the mix, as long as it's not atonal. I hope "the system" doesn't ultimately take this away.
Re "I hope "the system" doesn't ultimately take this away". They are working on it. You look like a white man! This means all the hobbies, films and music you enjoy must be replaced by the message.
Wow imagine like there was this magical thing called "music", something that has enough subtlety, nuance, complexity, that it allows for many perspectives, many interpretations, many feelings. Imagine an artistic manifestation that isn't just a disposable consumer product. What a wonderful thing that would be.
04:50
Why do you judge classical pieces by the same standards than four chords repeated over three minutes with some rhymed tropes overlayed? Why do you willfully ignore the idea of interpretation?
I majored in composition. The HUGE problem in the academic world is the emphasis on atonal music. Audiences do not want to hear it. Composers are encouraged to emulate Schoenberg, Webern, and Berg, instead of Hayden, Mozart, and Beethoven.
Oh, this is a really good point, I totally agree! It begs the question: who is classical music for?
Atonal is absolute suicide if classical music wants to survive lol I can’t stand it. It’s so bad .. I put it next to death screamo metal on my personal list of music I really dislike lol
@@PeaceNinja007
does nikos skalkottas count as an atonal composer? i think his music is pretty good and definitely tolerable to the average person in the street
@@vaylard9474 I guess Im not the average person lol I couldn’t stand his music. He’s as atonal as it gets for me lol
It's hard to believe The Rite of Spring is over a 100 years old. 😂
0.39 - I have never heard a single classical musician say this. Maybe the labels, but certainly not the musicians. Those few musicians that do say this don't get hired back after a little while.
2:28 - I really don't know what albums you're listening to. What albums sound muddy? Those volume changes might be the dynamic changes that are written in the music. I seriously doubt the producer is going ham at the controls and playing with the levels...
3:27 - "We want stereo sound!" Yes, as opposed to the mono sound that classical albums use....except they are also recorded in stereo sound. Mono hasn't been around for sometime now. I find it funny where she mentions the soundproof studio booth because I'm trying to imagine the logistical challenges with recording an ensemble. What do you do? Book the studio for a few years and give each musician a change to record their parts without letting them listen to their peers play with them?
3:45 - Really? Seriously? Apparently classical musicians are so stuck in the past that we haven't figured out the magic that is...anything greater than 1080p video quality.
4:40 - "It's never original music." David Bruce would like to have a word with you. While I do admit that contemporary music in the classical sphere does not get the coverage it sorely deserves, it's a bit foolish to say that "It doesn't exist."
7:05 - The practice of performing older composers works instead of primarily focusing on contemporary composers occurred earlier than that. Even when this happened though, there was still an emphasis on new music that doesn't exist today. Composers that had multiple works successfully premiere after 1900: Debussy, Ravel, Stravinsky, Copeland, Bernstein, Ives. Contemporary music has had less focus, but it's not just because older music is performed.
7:45 - There you go again pretending contemporary classical music doesn't exist.
10:00 - Ensembles do tours. They may not be as frequent as pop artists, but they do exist. The pay scale of a musician varies greatly depending on where you look. Musicians in one of the big 5 might have a six figure salary (w/ the conductor making way too much money), but there are a variety of regional orchestras where the musicians make a fraction of that sum. Every ensemble is different and has a different financial situation. They're not one in the same here.
10:40 - This...really depends on where you're going to concerts. A ticket to the MET Opera will attract a different audience than that of your local symphony orchestra.
12:26 - Ownership model? You realize pop artists are owned by record companies with rich CEOs right? Also, a ticket to a symphony orchestra concert will often be cheaper than a ticket to any artist in the top 10 right now. I challenge you to look up your local symphony or other classical ensemble and check ticket prices. If it was truly only "For the elite", then the prices would at least match what Ariana Grande charges right?
As a side note, your sources are very odd. The first source is from 2021 and it a short blog post that is filled with conjecture. It makes the case that classical music is dying because of a few UT performances that didn't have large audiences (during a pandemic) and because of when it was written, it couldn't use any sources from a year later that show a little more positive outlook on classical music. The next two sources are a decade old and the final one is a Classic FM article that makes the case that classical music dying is hyperbole due to something new apparently killing it sprouting up every few years or so.
Don't get me wrong. I understand what this video is attempting to do. It's just makes so many wrong assumptions about classical music as it has existed, and currently exists, that the video seems completely pointless. For example, blaming the performance of dead composers music seems weird when you take into account that this has been the case since Felix Mendelssohn conducted the Gewandhaus Orchestra in the 1830s. The last time I checked, there were a lot of composers after 1830 that were successful in their careers (The big 5 in Russia, Tchaikovsky, Stravinsky, Debussy, Ravel, Copeland, Bernstein, and too many more to list here).
That's what I want to see, that's the seed for a discussion if she answers
@@CrsD-Assxssin She won't answer.
"Composers that had multiple works successfully premiere after 1900: Debussy, Ravel, Stravinsky, Copeland, Bernstein, Ives. Contemporary music has had less focus, but it's not just because older music is performed. "
And you forgot to mention RACHMANINOFF!!! His piano concertos are gorgeous and have become a sort of rite of passage for every concert pianist. Not to mention LOTS of vocal choral and solo music! And of course Prokofiev too. It's almost hard to believe, in fact, that they didn't exist before that. 😂. Of course a lot has happened culturally since then, and i wouldn't say it's for the best, but we have yet to see what the 21st century will produce none the less. But of course the really great ones don't come except in handfuls per century, so perhaps people look too hard to find something special in every musician that writes a line of music the least bit known, getting all worked up that we're only paying 'old ones'. That never happened centuries ago and all the more so we shouldn't expect it now either. Great composers are great because they're rare and exceptional, and that will always be the case. 90% are always forgotten in a few decades. Nothing new, and that's normal.
Hear me: Anime and Video game orchestras are and will thrive even more in the future. Because story is KING. And this is the relatability to the audience. Also some of the best music I have heard comes from these and the meaning*** behind it due to the story and characters. I have discovered some of my favourite composers of all time because of them. Some scores are better than the animation itself and even the story. Keep an eye out for this.
Over the years I've watched Studio Ghibli movies with my daughter. She for the animation and story, I for Joe Hisaishi's wonderful music.
Well said...and I love your optimistic outlook in this direction...if more living composers, who may not be writing for Anime or video games, could think more about STORY...they would be more successful too (new relevant operas, ballet scenes, symphonic poems, etc) today's audiences need guidance in this way, you're absolutely right!!!
You really have no clue. All of this is being done on purpose by bad actors. They want to tear down the foundations of society. It's called the fifth column.
Final Fantasy and Pokemon
I guess Wagner really revolutionized music to the extent that it made motion pictures and video game music viable.
I think you are barking up the wrong tree. Classical music lovers like music not because it is ""relevant" but because it is beautiful, because it gives pleasure, and it continues ro do so after hundreds of years. Unfortunately, I really don't know how you get people to experience this pleasure. In my own case, when I was 15 my best friend became enamored of it, so I gave it a try and was smitten. Now, 77 years later, it still gives me intense pleasure, whether trough headphones on TH-cam or in person at the concert hall; and I am still happiest seeing the Marriage of Figaro yet again in a traditional performance that does not attempt to be "relevant!"
She doesn't know how to distinguish great music from good music. The reason the music of masters such as Beethoven and Mozart is still around up to this day is because it is music that has stood the test of time. Her knowledge and experience of Western art music may be so limited that's why she thinks this way about Western art music.
since you mentioned figaro, it was highly relevant in its day having touched upon power abuses by the nobility
@@PM_ME_MESSIAEN_PICS I think that people who enjoyed Figaro at the time didn't do so primarily because of its "relevance." After all, the primary audience did not consist of the oppressed masses.But that's just my opinion; and there are many operas that never had any "relevance," yet have remained popular over the centuries.
@@yon8378 could it then be that other forms of music that are more relevant than opera became more popular?
but I will have to agree with what you said
@@PM_ME_MESSIAEN_PICS Basically I dislike thhe word "relevant." Relevant to what? I believe that the only legitimate role of art is to give pleasure. If it does so it has fulfilled its purpose.
I love a melody, a tune. I've listened to new composers works and the ones I've listened to seem anti-melody. It's like they've been taught/instructed at their conservatoires that having a great melodic musical hook in their compositions is 'common' or low class, populist etc and should be avoided at all costs or they won't be taken seriously as a composer.
I hope the contemporary composers have other skills because their lack of listenable music output isn't going to sustain a composing career.
This is not as true as it used to be, but still...a very good point. If you think of the more recently 'popular' composers, like John Adams, Steve Reich, Philip Glass, Arvo Part and John Luther Adams, they have absolutely brilliant ideas and textures, but even they generally avoid the 'tune', and it does seem like academia still encourages originality over listenability, even if the serial methods aren't stressed as 'the way' as much as before...but I agree, melody needs to make a serious comeback in modern classical music. Composers should try to not worry so much about their peers and start writing music that they themselves would actually want to hear...then maybe we will have a new syntax
The need to impose consumerism on everything is the problem - the heritage of over a millennium of music isn’t solved by pandering to consumers just as with Jingju, Gagaku, Shinto temples etc- I indeed do blame the “consumer” - not everything exists for your tittilation, however much the USA wishes otherwise. And no classical music is not an “industry”. It’s centuries of our history. And another very important point is that the view that Western classical music is dying is quite parochial as it’s growing like crazy in China, compared to which the USA is barely a blip.
The symphony orchestra for the region i live in recently performed "die zauberflöte" for a family audience, which was in Danish instead of German and with an introduction to the story before. Ticket prices were an absolute steal too at, like, 13€ for adults and 6€ for children.
The hall was packed to the brim with families with children and elders alike. So I think this might be one way to go. It somewhat keeps the musical integrity in my opinion, while also being friendly towards new listeners.
That is something I see as a solution. The modernization to the max of classical music is something I don't like. Imagine going to a classical concert and seeing blinding lights and a see of fog. That is just distracting and takes away form the performance itself
So " Ticket prices were an absolute steal too "
Well, well! So who paid for the performance?
Interesting video but I think a lot of the points were iffy. The most problematic point though is the comparison of classical to bruno mars and other artists all doing the same elvis cover over and over. You stated this yourself correctly with the nutcracker example: this is not about the musicians, its about the composer or piece itself. The fact that there are multiple different performances of something just makes it more accessible rather than redundant as your point implies. Also the fact that orchestral works get replayed isnt really an issue either because since classical has existed for so long, its not really starved for content, there are so many incredible works that rarely get played, in a given year its very hard to find a single performance in the US for say Bruckner 1 for instance. Ive listened to so much classical and it would still take the rest of my life to continue to uncover still such a small part of it.
The biggest issue is that when people think about classical music they think about the most cliche and boring pieces, and when its "made modern", its just the boring stuff rehashed in a slightly more modern way, yet ultimately still cliche and overplayed. Everybody and their mothers know a grand total of 4 notes from Beethoven 5, but what about the rest? Pomp and circumstance, played at graduations, has an amazing second theme that nobody knows because the first part is played on a loop. Bach Toccatta and Fugue, same thing, the media just covers the opening 5 seconds of it.
People would like classical music if it were given the spotlight and attention on the world stage. We dont need something new, because already nobody knows Shostakovich or Bruckner or Mahler or Prokofiev (and soooo many more I could keep listing). The work these legends have produced are some of the most beautiful, epic, grandiose, powerful, and absolutely mind blowing earth shattering music to exist, but they are vastly unknown to the general public. The concert halls do their job of programming it, but people dont go because they dont give it a chance. In their minds they have already associated classical with some trivial early classical baroque style of music when really its so much more. That is the problem. Making something "new" where somebody is just rehashing Vivaldi 4 seasons (which is funnily enough the bruno mars example) is not going to fix this.
In education, in the UK at least, 'classical' music is considered only one of many 'world' musics (sic) (and sick). Joe Soap and his mates are made to study a Shakespeare play or two, but not a Mozart symphony or, heaven forbid, a Shostakovich string quartet! Critical listening (nowadays contaminated by critical theory - not of itself, of course) is for deconstructing and destroying, not for learning, challenging and inspiring. Thanks for your excellent comment!
Excellent points! Unfortunately this state of affairs is accompanied by 'nobody cares', because music today is just a backdrop and those who control the cultural ecosystem keep it that way. Don't anybody dare stop and listen to anything complex or deep for even a minute, it might cause the 'wrong' kind of inner transformations. People don't go even to rock concerts to listen, but more to get strong sensations of a primitive nature that act as a catalyst for the rest of their lives .. made of similar substance. But more often than not music is just a superficial background phenomenon and nothing more. That has been pretty much accepted, so how are you going to convince anybody to dedicate some span of attention to 'listening'. Way too much effort.
Appreciate and agree with this response!
good point! most ppl only know like two composers max and there are still so many composers that rarely even get performed at concert halls. not sure how to get more people to know about these composers though. i think early childhood music education can help though
Discussions like yours always remind me of a cartoon in the New Yorker that cracked me up: A well dressed couple is walking by a marquee announcing a Symphony program, which reads...."Now playing: Brahms Symphony Nr 1 in C minor, and Wet Tee Shirt Contest".....this is a perfect parody of what you are suggesting.......
that's what alfred schnittke did, and even ultra conservative and racist composers like john borstlap think he's good
Lovely, i think the reason audiences aren't tuning in to classical music is much more insideous ... people aren't playing music or singing themselves anymore.
In the past everyone sang at church . People would play folk instruments down the pub.
"Musicians" were those fancy orchestra people. But in reality most people made music themselves even if it was whistling.
Not sure if you have noticed but happy birthday is not sung as confidently in the past.
You can appreciate the experience of watching a sport ... yet if you have never played it yourself you don't appreciate it as much as you could. For instance watching cricket is popular here in Australia because most Australians have played backyard cricket ... yet American audiences don't get cricket because they haven't played it themselves.
I'm in my forties went to church as a kid played flute in a school band and was in the choir. - classical music is accessible to me because i played Minuet in G .
Did you know pop music is dying too? The streaming model is killing album sales.
But i think all commercial music is dying because people have lost their ability to sing and to play music.
This is a really interesting point I haven’t considered before! I think you’re absolutely right!
An important point! In the 19th and early 20th century, lots of people had pianos at home, and piano music was at its zenith because those who played the piano, if only a little, knew how to appreciate it. Later came instruments like the saxophone, and jazz became very popular. In the second half of the 20th century it was the electric guitar and rock music. Now so many youngsters don't play any musical instrument at all and therefore don't appreciate the music made with them. What consequently dominates is machine-produced pop.
I think it started with defunding music teaching in public schools and just further spiraling down cultural decay
That is unfortunately, absolutely true imho...a new initiative, like the old "Save the Music" is needed so bad, along with an updated approach to music appreciation to supplement a new curriculum
Still, there's something to be said about "cultural relevance". How long are current musical trends going to stay relevant, and further ahead ... what will we do when we run out of trends ?
I strongly doubt anyone will remember Taylor Swift a century or two from now.
That is, if music is still made by human beings by then
I started listening to symphonic metal bands like Epica and Haggard. I loved the voices and instruments, because of that I started listening to classical music and now im a huge fan of Opera. So in my case, it was metal music that made me love classical music
I went from rock and punk to Classical back in the early 1980s. I was seduced by the heaviest stuff, Wagner and Beethoven in particular. Later I went on to be an opera composer.
The overlap between classical and metal is pretty strong - most of my metal-loving friends also like classical music. Both genres stress instrumental elements (and virtuosity), high drama, and (at this point) are somewhat outside of the mainstream. And, classical music has been a big influence on metal since its formative years of bands like Deep Purple, Uriah Heep, and Scorpions.
I really recommend the Black Mages: One Winged Angel
Classical musicians have always been poor, many of the great composers barely scraped by and were not appreciated until after they died. Mozart was buried in a pauper's grave. His music didn't die. If anything, CM is much more alive and widespread now than it ever was, the music of Mozart et al. is enjoyed by far more people today than ever before. And it seems like Early Music using period instruments is continuing to grow. I'm sure composers from the Renaissance to the Romantic never imagined their music would survive this long and be appreciated all around the world. Thanks to TH-cam and IMSLP I continually discover music from previous centuries that is "new" to me.
I took over our Community Symphony last season (2022-2023) We are all amateurs. (I have my Masters in Music Education, but was a pianist and classical guitarist with a bit of musicology in my background.) We have people coming from larger cities to play with our group, because we do a variety of less difficult music from Baroque standards through 10 year old movie and tonal classical music. We also play popular standards. I think, for our audience, anyway, the length of the pieces and the length of the concert make a difference. We are now doing thematic concerts of five to seven shorter pieces from different eras in 75 to 90 minute concerts (including intermission, which includes refreshments, a nice place to sit and chat with friends, and players going out to mingle with audience members.) This season we featured Vivaldi in our March concert, and Mancini in our April concert. Tonal and tuneful and really appreciated by the musicians and the audience. Next season, I'm programing Litvinovsky and Andrew Lloyd Weber in November, and trying to get us into Helvi Leiviska for the spring. I always throw a standard classical composer into every program, too.
Our musicians range in age from 15 to 75. The biggest gain in membership is the 23 to 35 year old cohort. Think about it - you can work with other people without having to be 'social' - or you can be social, if you want. You work together to reach a goal and create a thing of beauty. You are important to the final project, but if you've had a rough day, other musicians are there to support you and help you lose your problems for a couple of hours while you let your anxious brain function to make sense of a puzzle that IS solvable. You can tell your spouse, "this is my weekly scheduled time to be an adult, and it's your night to stay home with the preschooler and baby." I honestly believe the mental health benefits of recreating this complex beauty together are so relevant to society today.
I know this isn't the big 'business' side of highly trained musicians going on tours and playing impossibly technical masterpieces, but I think it's where classical music always has to have a presence if it's going to survive. And - let's face it - this music will change and disappear just as all of humanity's cultural icons do. We don't know what the music of Ancient Rome or Greece really sounded like. We have descriptions, but we have not experienced it. Some day, if humanity survives, this music will fade completely, or change and become something different. That's the way of the world.
I know that some time ago in Amsterdam they held piano concerts in cafe's and bars. One of the reasons why they did that was because there were plenty of people in their 20's and 30's who were into classical, however, they didn't like going to fancy places to listen to it.
I really like classical and jazz (which was even lower on that chart), but the snobby people who go to these (fancy) events really turn me off. To me, a world without these 2 genres of music being performed would be a less beautiful world, so I really hope they can reinvent themselves.
Agreed!! I'm 24 and the worst part about the concerts is the audience. Pretentious, snobby, judgy. I still go, usually alone, practice ignoring or talking back at them every single time.
Classical music is the best music we have and will never die but impossible to create something new in its garden. So, this is the reason why jazz is more actuell. Of course i love jazz as much as classical music.
Jazz is boring
Classical is better and superior
@@SMCwasTaken 😂😂
3:36 is bizarre to me. Classical sounds the best in my headphones. Granted, they're somewhat expensive headphones, but still. The sound quality on a typical modern DG, Decca, Naxos, Chandos, or Pentatone release (for instance, not to exclude other great labels) is light years better than a typical pop or rock album.
With respect to the rest of the thesis, it has given me food for thought but I don't know if I'm on board with the totality of it. I am a classical nut, and am not wealthy by any means. I also like pop, rock and jazz. But classical is an absolute tonic in my life, and a good 90% of my music purchasing in the last 5 years has been CM. My family and I get to perhaps 5 paid concerts a year with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and then attend a few more free concerts outdoors in Millennium Park. Between the two it seems like there is demand for the music - the venues are always packed.
If it were hard for me to find live events to attend, I might be more in line with the thesis here. I do understand the critique that the majority of money is coming from wealthy patrons and serves to reify their tastes... but I share similar tastes, and hasn't it always, to some degree? Haydn was employed by either a baron or a prince for basically 50 years.
I do however totally agree that the stuffiness and etiquette of the live CM experience should be loosened up.
I think it depends on *who* is in those audiences. If it’s the same people over and over again, that’s also worrying. And perhaps the repertoire? I can fully imagine that “An Evening at the Movies” might be an incredibly in-demand concert for the CSO, but perhaps Haydn would be less so. I definitely agree that there are loyal fans and shows aplenty, but the financial health of most organizations is frightening to consider. I never felt secure knowing my paycheck came from a house that was reliant on the generosity of its wealthiest audience members to stay in business. 😕
I agree wrt headphones, especially in today's overly noisy world. Sennheisers for me. :)
My opinion on this is that a lot of people don’t just listen to music because they like the sound. People have a lot of preconceived notions about what kind of music is meant for what kind of person. It’s a part many peoples self image and what subculture they feel they belong to and some people will only listen to the music of their subculture. This could be because they identify as a skate boarder, punk person, goth, or hip-hip aficionado. A lot of people perceive classical music as hoity-toity, uptight and for rich old people. If people just listened to what they thinks sounds good with no preconceived notions and paid attention to how it makes them feel, classical music would be extremely popular.
Kids give me hope. Having played many classical chamber concerts for outdoor events and schools, I've found lots of children are fascinated by the instruments and want to know more about them. They come up to the musicians wide-eyed after performances and ask great questions. Sometimes they'll ask "How do you turn it on?" They don't understand that acoustic instruments don't use electricity. So cute!
as a kid myself, I've never met another kid who's so fascinated with classical music in person.
i love practicing music, and i love to get people into listening great music, like Rachmaninoff, Liszt, Chopin, Beethoven, Bach, Scriabin
and i succeed every time. i think the problem is that people don't really explore the genre at all, but every time i help them find their taste in classical music, they just can't stop listening to it.
Modern concert band composers have figured out that people want rhythm and melody and they are producing some of the finest classical music of the past century.
Frank Ticheli, Omar Thomas, John Mackey, Adam Schoenberg, and more are writing music that teenagers are falling in love with. Groups like the @DallasWinds are recording this music and making it available to everyone. If we can ride this lull out, there is hope.
I support you in spirit but you just quoted people writing music for wind bands.
@@__-fu5sethese guys also do quality work for orchestra, Ticheli especially.
Orchestra music directors need to get on board that all music doesn’t have to be “challenging”. Quality music can also be enjoyable.
I had a professor that referred to a lot of new music as “wrong notes and drums”.
I think we are past that now, but people need to be able to make sense of it. Aubrey Bergauer’s studies show people fail to return because they didn’t know what was going on. We should do better job of telling them what they are hearing and if it may sound “challenging”, why it does so and it’s ok.
I think you're talking about "professional classical music" here. But most classical music, in terms of hours played, and listened, and sung, and acted, is amateur, and that's the stuff that gives people pleasure and, for kids, a great start in life. We're forming a (UK) group called "Campaign for Music", following the moves by the BBC to cut back on its professional groups (orchestras, choirs) and also the relentless education cutbacks in music education (ie instrumental and choral teaching) that's been going on for the past 20 years. I think things are different in different parts of Europe (and other parts of the world. China may be doing very well, for instance. Africa remains pretty untapped, I believe: at least, we don't see many classical musicians from that part of the world.) (Also consider the world of Theatre - we still do Old Plays, even if the proportion of New Plays is much higher than in Classical Music. But the world of theatre is much more flexible, so I think that part of your argument is spot on. BUT you still need classical musicians for your sound backing... and they have to learn somewhere. Which is what our campaign is about, its about maintaining a flow of money to ensure thaere's still a network of inspirational teachers, organisers, conductors etc. )
Classical music in North America was quite popular to the "common folk" well into the 70's. Why? Because you had things like the Firestone Hour, where Opera singers came on prime time TV to sing. Opera singers were on Late Night shows like Carson. Every cartoon and children's show had a classical music soundtrack. It was appreciated, marketed to, and shown to everyone. If classical music is hundreds of years old, how come in 1970 it was everywhere, and in 2020 it's nowhere? The music didn't change, the culture did. You are not incentivized to discover and study "Elite" anything anymore. Instead of being taught we must improve ourselves, learn, grow, and mature, people are being told they're perfect just the way they are, don't need no education, or refinement. If you can't be a TikToc singing star by the time you're 14 with 0 effort involved, they don't bother. Look at the Grammy winners this year. Ice Spice, Taylor Swift, Harry Styles, Cardi B. Objectively braindead, soulless music.
We've failed as a culture. That's why high art is dying. We're not being taught what is good and what is not. We're not being taught to value what is good. We've failed music.
Music in general is dying, not just classical. And I care. I like music.
As for "recorded sound as close to as if live - it sucks" (and all the other points about "changing volume" aka _dynamics,_ not using compressors or electronic/digital mixing & individual mic'ing etc). No, it doesn't suck. It's an acoustic performance, vs. arguably extremely artificial ones, putting things together & modifying sound arbitrarily with "modern studio production". Might as well make everything electronic, like some do. Or AI. _That's_ what sucks, and has gotten so bad that I hardly buy any music these days in the non-classical realm. Prove me wrong, lol.
What is killing the Classical Music Industry? Is the free of charge access, for the first time in history, whe need to accept that Music is free or almost free. The only way to combat piracy was let access to plataforms. That causes that the music is free for all except for institutions, musicians, etc... The platform economy is not strong enough to sustain the industry. Leting free of charge, people are not encouraged to assist to concerts, like before.
Regarding the "new stuff" there is the basic stuff everyone knows like Canon in D, Beethovens 5th and Ravel's Bolero. But there is just so so sooo much classical music that has recordings, not to mention most are far longer than most of what is pushed out now.
I studied composition and classical guitar performance in conservatory school for a decade. Earned multiple degrees in both my undergraduate and graduate years. And honestly, I ended up quitting the entire genre. I now play more rock, metal, jazz, funk, jam, and pretty avoid classical altogether. Why?
Two main reasons:
1. The scene really is dying. There's therefore almost zero job opportunities in this field of classical music. And the two jobs I DID have as a teacher I lost, due to the fact that many of these schools unfortunately lost so much money in their programs recently, they couldn't find adjunct like myself after a year or so.
2. It's really not a stereotype that classical musicians are very elitist. I've experienced first hand the extreme levels of borderline narcissist personality disorder from many of these overly wealthy, yuppie prodigies, and snobby professors. It's pretty insufferable to be around those people, so honestly that was a major turning point in my genre switch.
Oh man, I’m sorry that was your experience. 😣 It sounds similar to mine too, it’s such a shame that such beautiful music has gotten wrapped up in so much nonsense. I was definitely one of those elitist musicians. If I hadn’t injured myself, god knows what kind of person I would have wound up becoming. I hope you feel more at home in your new genre work. 🙏
@@ScoresUnstitched What kind of injury did you sustain?
@@PeaceNinja007 I hemorrhaged one of my vocal cords about 5 years into my professional career. 😕
@@ScoresUnstitched Oh 🤭 Can’t even imagine how that happened .. or felt.
Hope you’re okay now
Opposite for me. Being Asian, ofc my parents forced Classical Piano down my throat. But during my teen years I rebelled, went all in on guitar playing rock, metal and jazz. Now, I'm in my 30s, going back to my classical roots, playing Classical Piano pieces. Sure, I never attended any conservatories, so I don't know how stuffy those people are; but I definitely find Classical music way more interesting than rock, metal or jazz.
Went to Konzerthuset Copenhagen with my 16 year old son. And guess what? He loved Ligeti and Messiaen, wasn't excited about Haydn. I think it has to do with "Hörgewohnheiten" and concert halls would be very wise to address this curiosity in more modern classical music among younger generations. And most importantly to invite people to be part of the conversation (e.g. explaining the music)
Hörgewohnheiten translates as "listening habits".
imo, classical recordings of the 90s into the 2000s were peak. the goal is to simulate the experience of sitting in a concert hall, and the reason why there is a massive industry of hi-res music and audio equipment, it compliments the genre well. i think if you want to raise your experience with listening to classical music you should probably start with your source, and then your equipment. a quality source (hi-res lossless audio, not streamed), with a quality DAC and amp paired with reference headphones (my preference; Sennheiser HD800S) helps a ton. things like dynamics, instrument separation, soundstage play a huge factor.
i've been a subscriber to my local orchestra for over 15 years now and i can attest that although it's difficult to simulate the experience of sitting at a concert hall and hearing every instrument sing harmoniously in sync, getting extremely close is a possibility. the only issue is, it's not cheap.
I completely agree, but it’s such a shame that’s the case. The cost is so prohibitive for so many people. I think I’d ultimately prefer having two experiences: the recorded and the live. That might also bring us closer to the relevance of other music genres in today’s world. Instead of catering to the 1% who have the equipment, why don’t we cater to the 99% who don’t?
Well put...it is another barrier to entry to have to get all this high end equipment to fully enjoy the classical experience-like you said, it's another elitist element to contend with, that potential new listeners will turn away from
So, what can we do about it though really??? Is it all about EQ, Compression, and Multitracking every single instrument and singer in a Mahler symphony to make it "punchy" enough for the kids to climb on board??? I'm not sure...I worked with a video/audio production company that recorded and filmed student orchestras and marching bands, etc...and I can personally attest that with a good orchestra in a GOOD room, the two condenser mics over the conductors head, really can produce a rich, powerful recording...especially for the homogeneous strings, but depending on that hall and the pieces performed, there are too many variables in that situation that make "room sound " just awful like you said...what about rearranging some of the orchestral seating to make a more balanced sound (in other words, in modern music, the bass register is always in stereo, but in the traditional orchestral set up, the bass is mainly to the right of the Sonic spectrum, making it a bit odd for modern ears-let alone the period being performed, etc) sorry this is so long, but what do you recommend about improving the recorded sound??? Love your video, editing, and delivery btw...especially kicking down the 4th wall for product placement LMAO!!!
@@ScoresUnstitched It's not hard to get a good pair of headphones, they are quite cheap nowadays. I would even say pop music would sound better if they were more like classical or jazz recordings.
Wow! You gave me so much to think about! Thank you for another excellent video.
Room sound: that's such a great point!! I've always loved piano solo (I play piano) but I also think I prefer listening to solo recordings like piano or cello partly because you can hear the rich little details of the instrument (e.g. hammer sounds of the piano). A full orchestra probably loses this detail because of what you pointed out.
This was a very insightful video!! I totally agree - people absolutely will always like classical music as it remains a unique way to very effectively tell story i.e. film scores plus the music is just good. It's the presentation that needs to be modernized. Easier said than done but with patience and inspiration I think it really can stay alive. Also amazing and fun editing!!
A very interesting point you just made with the recording thing, nowadays with commercial music we get the sound "in your face" clean and punchy, but for example, last week I was watching/listening Atmospheres by Ligeti and... it was like everybody in the concert hall had tuberculosis, they totally ruined the recording :(
I've just recently begun composing, not academically trained and entirely self taught, and trying to get started as an original composer is daunting. I don't have the skills to play the works i write, so I'm left to ask others to do so, and most musicians know the odds of money are low. And i also compose in the "archaic" styles of classical music, not modern atonal.
I would argue to solve the death of classical music will take people seeing the composer differently. Most people don't take the word seriously anymore, or when they do, they expect this "greatness" like you're the second coming of Mozart. Musicians and composers will need to work together, it's not about "going solo" anymore. I think strong composing/performing pairs will be a way forward for the genre. Thanks for the video.
To say that Motzart et al were no different than pop artists today, is a stretch. There is the item of talent. Some names today are pumped up by a music industry on the basis of small kernel talent. The words legend and genius get bandied about until they are meaningless. Some years down the road it's..."I'll never forget ole whatsisname"
The fact is not that there is less good music. It's just enough. Rather, the majority of people have simply different needs in music. I think it’s quite normal that some track without much meaning or musical content gains billions in popularity compared to new classic masterpieces. Classical music has not always been in such great demand.
It is worth accepting the fact that the era has already been replaced by a completely different era. We no longer wear wigs or ride in carriages. The world has changed and so the culture is changing. From this point of view, music finds a new way of expression. Now I'm talking specifically about the modern movement. On the one hand, it causes a lot of contradictions, on the other hand, it helps to understand that the past remains the past and we will not return to it again, it is lost. Still, let's be honest, today's acoustics, instruments, and performers are not at all the same as under Bach, Mozart or Chopin. Everything is constantly changing. I think Chopin might not have recognized his works after hearing them at any world competition
Well, part of it is that classical music got increasingly esoteric....overly intellectual....one elephant in the room is atonal music....the public doesn't get it....the thing is that there is a ton of underperformed, under-recorded high quality tonal classical music being written...the conundrum is the orchestras program little of it because they feel only the tried and true brings the audience in. European classical music is still very tied to the Avant Garde. I think they have to ditch the canon to some extent and get unfrozen...and speak a musical language people can understand.
The marketing aspect is one key...people like Two Set Violin have the right idea. They are showing a fun side, both honoring classical tradition and poking fun at conventions and cliches. And singers like Jacob Joseph Orlinski are great exemplars of a new classical music that appeals to a new generation. He's hot, can appear shirtless in a video, sings like an angel and he's a marvelous breakdancer... but you know talent and being marketable and beautiful don't always align. The other thing is when you talk about new music, and consumption..the marketing and demand cycle is about churning out mass produced, highly synthetic studio music...most of it consists of a few basic chords...so while the music that sells millions in streaming now is relevant-- as a species it has some currency--the songs itself are relevant for about a minute. Let's look at the reality that this video overlooks. It is a testament to the music and performers (wealthy patrons too for better or worse) that music written over 2 centuries ago is still around at all. I can tell you catagorically 99.9 percent of what is relevant now will NOT be around in 50 years. Does anybody know a pop tune that was a hit from 150 years ago? Not many. There are some old traditional songs...most older songs like church hymns have institutional continuity to account for their survival including Christmas carols
I do feel that adapting to streaming and music as recording is another key. People need to take music with them anywhere. The other rub is that to get a symphony orchestra together to perform and to record requires a concert all, just on sheer scale or a studio big enough to hold an orchestra....There may be something archaic about this but it's darn special. Of course with today's engineering musicians in an orchestra can record parts and assemble them in a studio...but it's still way more challenging than recording a 5 piece rock band.
Which brings me to another point...there is a complexity and quality in making and performing this music that demands a lot and by and large is in its intent opposed to mass production...I used to write novels. My first one took me 7 years to write. It was just complex and took a lot of time because I have a very organic process and am not writing to formula...And I wrote it and took that time to do this without any real hope that I would ever make money...I wrote it for it's own sake...most "relevant" music today is just written to a formula that makes money...write a certain song that's like the one that was a big hit last year and you have a big hit this year...that said there are wonderful new songs being written but most of the best are not massively popular...they have smaller dedicated followings.
the length of classical music is another barrier. It takes a person looking for more than a good beat, who will sit through a 30 or 40 minute composition. As I compose music and post on TH-cam...I know that it's hard to get anyone to listen beyond 2 or 3 minutes...about the length of a pop song. Can we blame this on the classical music establishment? I think not....So without turning classical music into nothing but miniatures, it would be hard to compete with the listening habits of a contemporary audience and survive on it's own terms. i.e. symphonic or operatic music. It does seem that you have to tell a story because everybody has converted to thinking in terms of tv and movies...they like move scores with a classical sound so long as they can relate to characters or story. So what then of absolute music that just exists for it's own sake?
Perhaps the truth is there is not much of an audience for that simply because we live in different times with different technology and very different values about what it means to connect with music.
In other words, accept that classical music is on its deathbed and give the Public something else!
@@kendrickpereira37 No realize that there is a need for change. You never know when ideas and tastes come back to different values...30 years ago if you had said people would be releasing their music again on vinyl records you would said they were crazy...but I wonder if you are even old enough to remember. Composers write what they like and they do it because they can.
I love your video! You’re so smart and you get it! Don’t listen to the people giving weird, vague criticisms - people like you is what we need!
Thank you so much for this video! I'm a young musician who is very much in love with classical tradition, but not that one of 20th century, but of those centuries before when people composed and performed, improvised their own music.
I write, improvise and perform only my music. 🥰
One of the mosts popular composers in classical music today is Rachmaninoff (his concertos and other piano music are a staple in any international competition) , and that's 20th century. Prokofiev is another one that produced amazing timeless stuff in the 20th century, there were many more. Pop music is simply a symptom of a degrading culture and yes it does steal from true art, but it will never completely win over the world.
I'm in a rustbelt city with a first class orchestra, which mostly performs canon--very well--but which with every season seems to pander more and more to the tastes of the unschooled. There are smaller ensembles here who frequently commission new pieces and premiere them and I increasingly see younger people at these performances, and they are engaged with the experience. As the first class orchestra's programs increasingly feature stuff like classical renditions of The Beatles and the music of holiday blockbusters, and the candlelight concerts you mention, I hope it succeeds in bringing new subscibers in. But I'm so glad that there are alternatives that are more challenging and fresh, because that is more likely to create lifelong classical music fans from those already accustomed to hearing classical music in video games and YT videos.
I totally agree! I definitely don't advocate for *all* classical music to swing to the other side and try to pull in new audiences. The problem is when there's very little "entry level" music being programmed at all. Balance is the name of the game, imo.
@@ScoresUnstitched: New, contemporary music would be fine... if it were pleasant to listen to. Most contemporary composers seem to have an aversion to lovely melodies and harmonies.
I will show my students this! GREAT video. Thank you Cait!
I play in a Baroque ensemble....and would rather perform for the 3 or 4 hundred thoughtful people who attend the concerts than the 50,000 Swifties that jam a stadium to hear that pablum....
I will also disagree with the last point. I do in fact think that the overwhelming majority do not like classical music itself as a genre, and a lot of it is, well due to reasons stated earlier in the video(electronic music, and other things). They even dislike instrumental music in general (unless it involves electric guitar, for the most part). "This has no words, this has no beat, this is boring because of that"
All things I heard as a 2nd grader in the 90s when I was trying to get my friends to listen to what I liked at the time. It's such a foreign musical concept to people now, even at the earliest of ages they are colored by those biases already. They no longer get exposed to it on a consistent basis at home, or school, or in the mainstream anymore. Even most Churches(which is really the last place it has some sorta main stream exposure) have gone away from it and replaced it with guitar and drums, with lights and fog and all this other stuff to attack every sensory in the body. Classical will always have an 90 degree uphill battle if that's what it has to go up against.
Sharing a thought because of the headphones thing... don't ditch the music, ditch the headphones!
On a hi-fi stereo, the intimacy and high dynamic range of the recordings create a startling realness that can be "seen" just as much as heard. Placement of instruments is easily distinguished, and the glorious spaciousness of the recording venues places you right there in the middle. The most subtle nuances of sound and movement are revealed. You won't just hear the bow move, you'll hear how they're moving it. I know that sounds mystical... it's hard to fully describe. Cheers :)
Oh my! In the first five minutes you've summed up exactly what I've been feeling deep inside for years as an performer. I wasn't even aware of it until you put it into words. Now I'll keep watching. I just had to tell you this right away.
I feel like this video would’ve HEAVILY benefited from including examples of living composers (that aren’t film composers) who do write music audiences love, and know how to navigate the space of music in the 21st century. Max Richter, Christopher Cerrone, Mason Bates, and Takashi Yoshimatsu, just to name a few. Their music is much more digestible than what people typically think of contemporary classical music. This video left out a whole world of composers who are living today and are writing classical music. And the best part about their music? It doesn’t sound like something written 200 years ago. It still sounds new, and general audiences can enjoy and understand it (unlike the music of Boulez, Fernyhough, Stockhausen, etc.). I think having modern composers write in the style of Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, etc, is definitely not the solution. It will only sound like an imitation of older styles, and therefore still not be relevant to today. Composers need to write classical music that is still new, but that audience can enjoy. And there are composers already doing that. We just need more
You are absolutely right on this point...there IS new music being written for the old acoustic ensembles (sometimes integrated with electronics) by living composers who aren't serialists and it's fantastic, but it gets no real promotion so the general public has no idea its out there!!! Besides the ones you mentioned, also definitely check out the new works by Andrew Norman, Caroline Shaw, and Saad Haddad just to name a few more...it's not about rehashing Mozart Beethoven and Tchaikovsky, but its also not about abstract incoherence either...new composers don't have any rules to follow anymore, literally ANYTHING GOES today, so you can make a concerto or tone poem that incorporates melody *gasp*, functional harmony, but with some modern extensions, a narrative or fanciful title, a hidden tone row, a brief atonal episode for contrast, all done with impressionistic harmonies in a Minimalist type texture, and there's nothing wrong with that, or anybody stopping you!!! So as living composers we must be honest and appropriate to ourselves, know that any and everything is up for grabs, and just starting writing with genuine enthusiasm again, and NO FEAR OF MELODIES!!!
Not having access to a concert hall let alone a theatre in ones local is a huge problem.
I used to live in Adelaide "the city of choirs" WITHOUT A DEDICATED CONCERT HALL!
Also the act of going to see a musical, opera, or a classical performance is expensive because one has to travel far to see a good enough rendition.
And yes, unfortunately classical music does require listening for more than 3 minutes before the track changes.
Adelaide is the 'City of Churches' from what I remember
All music is dying, simply because people aren’t interested in music as they were. With so many other entertainment fields open to people today, and fewer gatekeepers, culture both high and low is becoming less important in people’s lives.
But having said that, I can say that where I I’ve classical music is thriving. There are a lot of orchestras and smaller ensembles, especially in the early music field.
I couldn't agree more! This was such a well made and fun to watch video 👏👏👏
Much to agree with, but.... TOO MANY GALLOPING ASSUMPTIONS! e.g., up to the 1970s music education was part of almost every public school K-12 curriculum. People can't learn to love it if they've never heard it, especially when they were kids. Also, classical music lost its life line to the popular music of its time. Classical music is e-v-o-l-v-i-n-g right before our ears. Been to a movie, a tv mini-series, How about Game of Thrones without its musical score. John Williams ain't the only one. Our problem is that we're not expanding the definition of classical music for gen-z, etc. There's plenty of good old, and good NEW classical music on Spotify & Pandora. So don't write your Requiem for classical music just yet.
Very interesting, timely....you bring up a lot of good points and have given me a lot to think about. But...classical music doesn't sound bad in headphones....Classical music sounds bad in BAD headphones. Given a good cd transport, a high-end amplified and top-of-the-line headphones the sound can be stunning.
I agree to a point! But millennials and Gen Zers (where classical music is already dead) don't need good headphones to enjoy the music they stream all the time. And that's where classical music needs to catch up. Needing fancy (read: expensive) equipment and an education about audio to enjoy something is just one more tick in the "elitist" column. 😖
@@ScoresUnstitched That's an unfixable problem to some extent though. Mostly passable audio equipment is practically free these days - my go-to earbuds are $20 (or less on sale) - but the Beatz and other poorly-designed hardware that get marketed to the masses are bad enough that they will obscure the qualities that make most classical-like music intrinsically enjoyable at all. Modernizing production and mastering and using stuff like compressors to make the music more presentable can bridge part of the gap, but hardware would need to change too.
@@Ithirahad My work earbuds are some crappy $40 ones.
Eh .. they’re not that bad. But they’re blown away by my Sony M4s, and my Audio Technica 150Xs .
I hope that’s not all you have ... if so .. let buy something i feel bad lol
@@PeaceNinja007 I'm pretty broke and my equipment is somewhat limited, but not THAT limited, haha. I do have AKG K240's or Audiotechnica M40x's for when it actually matters. My point is that DECENT (not good) audio stuff doesn't cost much, but it isn't marketed as hard as the overpriced garbage that literally sounds worse for something like classical music.
@@Ithirahad Ahh . . I sent that when I was at work .. I just realized I have the Audio Technica M50X .. not the M150x .. I don’t even think those exist 😂
Okay .. I was just feeling so bad thinking you only had some $20 earbuds lol
I think it was Mozart who said, (and I paraphrase with at least a bit of abandon--but not so much as to put something into his mouth that he wouldn't have said) music needs to be both original AND beautiful. By beautiful, of course, he meant something people want to listen to, will go out of their way to listen to, will PAY to listen to. Incidentally, Wolf was pretty good at putting his money where his mouth was at.
Came across this video and can totally get your points! Classical music really emphasizes the role of composers instead of performers while today's music does the exact opposite.
Old-school jazz emphasizes the role of performers, but it's nothing like today's popular music... This stuff emphasizes personalities and physical attributes of the performers rather than their ability to actually perform music, which is a situation that doesn't even lie on the scale you're describing.
Good point...and did you notice that poor Jazz was even lower on the overall streams list than classical???
Wow what a perspective changer honestly 🍃👌🔮great video!
You are correct on EVERY point! Excellent video.
If orchestras only played what the public wants to hear, in order to "stay alive", then we would experience the bizarre phenomenon of no longer having orchestras playing... classical music. There would only be soundtrack festivals (from video games, films and TV series). What defines classical music is precisely continuing to play the music of great composers. The term "classic" itself has as one of its definitions "that which is worthy of being copied, which transcends time and geographic space".
Classical music is not dying , it is only no more mainstream like many other music genre today. Classical music was never mainstream. "Classical music is dying" is same as saying "Music is dying" . Any music genre has his own group of listener, some listener groupe are smaller than other, nothing has changed. Money is a problem for all music if going live or production. Some argument are good in video (the money part) but cultural part is.....
Lot of music not made to be listen in noisy environement with a smartphone, that the reason why mainstream just sound like loud trash to overlay surrounding noise. Younger people are stuked in playlist made by non culturale AI and they only listen trash made for them. Just try to learn more about music history. Who payed for music and concert halls in past and today ? For music artist and creators , making money was ever a illusion made by media. Making music is just passion, you are not payed for the many thousand Hours to learn playing or creating music.
Soundtracks are the gateway drug in my experience & so many are more open to it.
The audience for classical music has always been predominantly older people. I'm Gen X so-called and when I was in my 20s going to concerts, it was the same. Watch concert footage from the 1940s - its the same. It is not and never will be for the masses and yes, it does take, for most, a little bit living to appreciate it. Don't be too concerned about it.
If the alternative is candlelight concerts and movie soundtracks I choose death
is takemitsu's ran suite not good enough for you?
If classical music has "fallen", what did it fall off from? Was it ever more popular than today in absolute numbers? Sure, it does not compete with whatever musical genre is currently the hype, but it does not have to compete (and it will survive that genre).
Some interesting and nuanced ideas here, and thank for you setting these out. Perhaps another interesting question connected to that of relevance is that of 'where is the value?' Starting from the point of asking how our musicking and even what kind of musicking can bring value to our audiences, and then doing some musicking that brings that value. This would also tie into your point about taking the music TO the audience, but instead places the audience first and asks 'what is the value in a musical experience for you?'
Kids don't get the option to play real instruments anymore. It's all rock school drums, guitar, keyboard and vocals here in the UK. Kids don't then get to hear and play classical music which often leads to a love of all music. Where are the flautists of the future to play Syrynx. The Clarinetists to play Rhapsody in Blue, to name just two beautiful pieces destined to stay in unplayed in the future.
Can't think of many videos I've watched on TH-cam that are based on such feeble premises and salted with quite so much irrelevance and lack of insight.
First of all, I disagree that Classical music is "pretentious" (i.e. working under the pretense) in its requirement for an elevated taste & higher intellect, BECAUSE it clearly does. Let's not PRETEND that everyone can appreciate it. One needs a powerful CPU that can focus its attention & processing power on extremely complicated sonic architectures to be able to elucidate its design & appreciate its meaning. That's not being pretentious; it's just telling the truth.
But music of the Common Practice Era 🤪 will never die, as long as intellectuals do not get extinct via natural selection because they'd rather read Nietzsche than get on Tinder 😅. They've been saying the same thing about Jazz also but it keeps breathing & evolving. Even Rock also seemingly had a cardiac arrest when that godawful Electro-techno-kookoo Pop (probably the only genre I couldn't stand) trend popped out in which DJs suddenly became "musicians" standing alone on stage just pushing buttons. I'm so glad it's not much of a thing anymore.
But IDK if it's all just about marketing. There will always be --- like I said tongue-in-cheek up there --- an audience for the classic stuff, but it will have to evolve & incorporate the contemporary sounds, pop culture, language, issues & arts for it to truly stay relevant. And with that, we'll have to be willing to break all the true pretentious rules. I've seen a couple of the recent Met productions of brand new operas like "Champion" (by a Black composer whose name just escapes me right now) that was supposed to have Jazz elements & dealt with contemporary LGBTQ issues. It was just too damn heavy & still sounded like it conformed to the strict rules with very little Jazz music in it. The Gershwins, who were Jewish, did it so much better with "Porgy & Bess," which sounds so much more progressive & current even NOW. They should be the blueprint. But the good thing was that those newer works have supposedly increased ticket sales. But I don't think that's enough, though. I mean, you want audiences to actually get excited & flock & destroy Ticketmasters' servers a la Taylor Swift for the Met? 😝🤣 Why not incorporate Hip-hop, street dancing & current lingo into opera? Too much rule-breaking? Well, there you go with being truly pretentious now. Thank you for listening at least.
P. S. For those who haven't heard it yet, check out the album "Handel's Messiah: A Soulful Celebration" that won a Grammy in the early 90s. They re-arranged Handel's oratorio into Soul/Gospel/R&B/Hip-hop songs. Kinda like what Sister Act 2 did also with Beethoven, which I think was inspired by that album. Just to give you a better idea of what I'm talking about. It doesn't have to be that unorthodox, but I do think there's a way to make new Classical pieces sound more exciting to current audiences.
Not to argue, but I have ADHD and can't focus to save my life and I still love classical music. I usually have it on the background when I'm working, and listen to the same pieces several times for them to really register in my brain. On classical music needing big brain - that depends, I think. It's such a vast repertoire that I believe anyone would find something that they would like, given enough exposure. Some pieces are easier to listen to - eg, when I was around 5, my kindergarten teacher played us a recording of Waltz of the Flowers from Nutcracker and my whole group was so obsessed with it that we would beg the teacher to play it every day for a while. If it can grab the attention of a roomful of 5-year olds, I'm sure it can appeal to most people. On the other hand, it took me a while to get into Bach, his music really started to click with me after I learned more about what makes it great, and after many listens. And even I like a piece from the get-go, I really gain a new appreciation for it onve I've learned more about the composer and the background of said piece. While it does require some additional brain work, I really think most people have the capacity to do that once they get into the music. The main problem is the lack of exposure to classical music and the stereotype that only old and boring people can enjoy it.
Also i’m just going to say that i saw three concerts this weekend:
one chamber choir (quartet), one semi-pro regional choir, and the philadelphia orchestra performing mahler 3 with joyce didonato and the philly boys choir…
all of these performances were almost sold out in their respective venues….. so…….
I have many classical recordings of symphonies, concertos and large scale works for chorus and orchestra. The great majority are very well recorded, including many from the '50s and '60s on Mercury Living Presence and RCA Living Stereo. They sound great on headphones.
I feel like classical music as a genre is getting inherited by video games and movie music. More and more I see orchestras and even opera singers traveling on tours for specially good BGM's. The composers tend to have a background in it too, or take a lot of inspiration from. They are very interesting to listen and the recordings are excellent
Wow. That ad spot edit was amazingly creative
wow what an amazing video! your editing skills and production values are insane! absolutely incredible work. Thanks very much for your hard work, it's much appreciated
I think film and gaming soundtracks are the key, and it definitely needs to get away from the image of pretentiousness and gatekeeping. I'll be honest, I wasn't interested in classical music when in was twenty, I was obsessed with Oasis and other Britpop bands, but soundtracks from people like Howard Shore and John Williams helped me appreciate the genre a lot more.
It isn't dying, it's just a smaller and smaller portion of the overall music scene. I'd bet, by raw dollars, the same amount is spent on it now than 50 years ago.
People say the same thing about all kinds of things. In my industry, for several years people said that tablets and phones were killing the desktop. Which was kind of true, but only kind of. In reality, desktop computing is bigger than ever and still very important, it's just a much smaller part of the overall market now.
That is exactly what I am thinking, I am trying to explore the lesser known music of earlier centuries, and there is a lot, like really really a lot, and I compose from time to time, even though in ancient style, but I am serious about it
I know the need to revolutionize our repertoire, and maybe our performance
1:56 Common uncultured Millenial L.
Before I respond to other points I'd just like to say that I've gone through some other videos you have and have really enjoyed your content and videos. It's always interesting to hear thoughts and view points on this subject, even if I disagree with some of it. I really appreciate the effort and thoughtfulness you've put into your videos.
Excellent Cait. Just discovered your YT site. As a product of the Royal Academy of music I’ve often asked myself why Classical musical has fallen from grace at so many levels. Whilst Rock n Roll has been my path since then I watch in awe my ‘classical’ friends continuing to pursue surely the toughest of musical careers. I find myself agreeing with your points of view wholeheartedly and commend your optimistic suggested ‘fix’. Keep up the great work !
Not true, classical music studio recordings were perfected as early as the late 1950s. People have been saying that Classical Music is dying since I was a kid in the 1960s. Ain't happened and the audience for classical music in the Far East is huge. Notice you are wearing Royal College of Music Hoodie, incidentally. Composers are different from rock artists, by the way. They were about developing music, not selling toons and touring to make millions.
You can't develop music if you're not selling anything.
@boptillyouflop Au contraire, you can't develop anything musically worthwhile if you are.
This is a very underrated video. I appreciate it.
I don't know whether classical music is dying or not. I just know my new found love and adoration for it is complete. I found this love in my 50s. And being able to purchase tickets at considerably ticket prices than a football enables me to sample a number of works by numerous composers. This all started by attending the opera in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Attending the opera was a childhood dream of mine. While listening to each opera i discovered a love for Puccini and Mozart. I began to realize that many of these melodies were already familiar to me because i heard them as a child in LoonetTune cartoons or perhaps as background to a commercial or in a film. Now i could place that familiar melody with a composer. I'm able to see many symphonies by using the Passport feature with a local orchestra. I pay a flat fee to attend a set number of shows throughout the season. The orchestra features more but those additional tickets i could pay for at a discounted price. In addition to the local orchestra there is a local classical chamber orchestra season. There is an opera season. There are other works featured throughout the area including Requiems. And local churches feature various works performed on the organ. Our community has a lively classical music calendar whuch is all new to me since i just moved here. Give it time. I think attendence at classical music concerts may begin to rise in the USA. Although birth rates are falling.
That was fresh, thx n Merry Christmas 🌲
Mixed feelings. You make many good points - on the one hand some "contemporary classical musicians" definitely are in denial about why audiences don't listen to their stuff, writing new music in an old style is looked at in disdain by "serious" composers ("why would you want to make something that's been done ten times better before?"), and when artist X announces they are starting to record the complete Mozart sonatas (or whatever) I will roll my eyes and wonder why, since they've been recorded a zillion times before and the market for such recordings is most likely saturated. On the other hand, to someone who's never heard Debussy before it can sound about as incomprehensible as atonal music (with the exception of some of his greatest "hits") so some education/repeated exposure really can make a huge difference, trying too hard to cater to one audience can lead to losing another (and perhaps worse: being force to making stuff you didn't want to be making in the first place, losing yourself in the process). If the feedback of the audience is: "add a beat" I would not necessarily want to follow that advice even if it might result in larger sales. I see an interesting paradox as follows:
real experimentation (which can be fun for its own sake, even if there's no audience for it) is easier to do as a hobbyist that doesn't need the income from the music to survive (but who probably cannot attain the level of technique or sophistication a professional might attain) than an artist who tries to survive from their art and trained for years to master all the required virtuosity but feel like they now need to "dumb down" to sell enough tickets to pay today's rent.
Finally, an approachable analysis of this issue 👏👏👏
lol..loved that sense of humour! Great video and observations.
Very well done and completely on point. Excellent watch.
Can i add that yes the acoustics of a room are cool and magical but also how f-ing cool would it be to have an amplified concert? Are you telling me that if mahler had access to subwoofers he would have passed? COME ON i want to feel those double basses in my body and not be distracted by some old geezer sneezing next to me because that is louder than the music.
I guess your question about Mahler will never be answered but I think it very understandable if he did "pass" on - what was it? "sub-woofers"?
It mystifies me why people like listening to an electrical reconstruction of a sound rather than to the sound itself.
Hello Cait, you're the first person to explain the exact same points I've been expressing to fellow classical musicians for a long time. In a lot of ways, I believe 'mainstream' classical music (standard symphonic classical music, opera, ballet, etc....) is already on its deathbed and has been for some time. I believe that most crossover classical music doesn't generally work because a lot of the times it's far too pandering and gimmicky and non-classical audiences can see through the act. In the same way that classical music of its time was based on the folk/pop music of its time which made it relevant, we would need a new generation of bold and daring musicians in our time to reject the status quo and make new and relevant compositions that they can perform while going on tour for more people to care. I also believe that as soon as a music genre becomes institutionalized (taught for a degree at a college), it's almost always a death sentence for said genre. You can see how Jazz is slowly dying in the same way as classical music already has, and not too far behind is Rock and Roll. To really drive the point home, will be hilarious to see the day when one can get a bachelor's degree in Hip-Hop Performance some 20+ years down the road, and wonder why Rap became a dying genre in the future. Just a prediction....would like to know what you think about all this, and thank you for your video!
This is such great food for thought, I hadn’t considered how schooling might have an effect on all this too but of course you’re right! I wonder how K-pop schools teach and if there are any differences we could learn from. 🤔
No way, I had no clue there were K-Pop schools! I really wonder how much of that works out. Can you manufacture success that lasts a lifetime? When I think of great artists of our time in popular music, I think of people who carved their own path in the industry, and those who stuck true to their vision and honed it. I doubt that can be manufactured, and it is something which one must discover on their own. What things do you believe might be different k pop schools vs conservatories?
Isn't Philip Glass such a modern composer who transcripts modern music into strict compositional form? But where does that lead him? Other instrumentalists and have you not seen are on his trails and earn their name in his shadow already. And the man is still alive (or so I hope to the second and beyond as I write this comment). And yes, it does sound more like a noisy gimmick than actual music. Sadly. I would love to hear a genuine composition based off of music from my own generation. But instead we have to deal with more Stockhausens and the likes.
Glass gets a bad rap really, but I get it...when you hear every TV commercial imitating Glassworks/MAD Rush, etc, it does start to become gimmicky...but besides his early hard-core minimalism like Music in 12 Parts...check out his 2nd, 3rd, and 8th symphonies, his 4th and 5th String Quartets, his concertos (violin especially)...and you will be moved by a genuine artist/composer who just happens to retain elements of his former Minimalist approach, now turned into modern masterworks (IMHO)
@@niemand7811 I personally don't mind Glass at all and I find his music quite brilliant. I'll say, I would count him as someone who is quite belonging to the establishment at this point. I'm thinking of people who are active and although I'm being agist, under the age of 40. When I think to the time when composers in the past were the most prolific, it generally has been in their youth....our current classical establishment doesn't generally care what young composers have to say and the opportunities to have their music played at the highest level is almost non-existent....which is tragic considering how many brilliant potential artists of classical music aren't interested because there isn't interest and money to backup the dead genre. You'll find most of our musical geniuses composing movie music, or making char topping pop tunes
Anyone seriously interested and currently listening to "classical music" can take exception (with plenty of evidence) to every point you've made. If you're only talking about dead European composers, it's a fairly moot point, anyway. But classical music to my mind covers everything from Gregorian chant to Duke Ellington. And like those two examples you can find examples of poor to superlative audio versions in a variety of media forms. You're looking at music from a marketplace standpoint, which is a poor barometer of quality or influence in the long run. Thanks, anyway.
As a composer, I definitely agree with the model of "support by music-loving customers rather than a rich elite." But, I sometimes wonder if "classical music is dying" because people like YOU, the insiders of the industry, are the ones bored by it. I know plenty of working class people who still love Beethoven and Bach, or would see an opera in period style, but here you are doing a video blog on classical music, and what do you have playing in the background? Not classical music! Maybe we need to expose more young people to listening to classical music, but not channel all music students into classical as performers, leaving the classical music business to people who actually love and are excited about the music. Not every person likes every genre of music, and that's OK - I think the key to any genre surviving is to give people enough exposure to it to decide if they like it.
I’m not a musician nor grew up with music in my home. But along the way I developed a taste for maybe not classical music but definitely symphonic music. Used to go the Hollywood Bowl 4-5 each summer in the 70’s & 80’s. It was wonderful. Moved away then came back recently. It’s still there, but back then the Philharmonic would play 5 nights with a few nights for other “stuff”. Now it’s reversed. Maybe one night out 10 is symphonies. There’s just not enough people demanding it.
A wonderful exposition! I wonder why classical literature (including Shakeare's plays, written centuries before mostclassical music) seems to be approachable by most people. I think it's because they feel there is some entry point to help them climb aboard. Challenging art 16:56 needs intrigue or initiation by a friend, or perhaps via television or even school lessons. Children are entitled to be introduced to the great artistic achievements of humans, if only to balance the tragic side.
I agree 100% with you on this...perhaps a more modern reworking of Bernstein's great Young People Concerts for the modern age would be ideal for turning the kids on to this beautiful sound world...I would say, keep Lenny's scripts and excerpts, and animate them, either using his voice (With MAESTRO...he is back in the spotlight now), or get a new classical evangelist to present Bernstein's approach (Benjamin Zander and Michael Tilson Thomas are past their prime), but someone with the energy and enthusiasm for it that is contagious is needed ASAP!!!
This is a rubbish elephant. I like ducks but I don't like elephants. Why can't elephants be more like ducks? Elephants don't have beaks, feathers or webbed feet and are way too large. 😜 Hoping that some of you will see the relevance of this comment in relation to the arguments used in this video!
You raise some good points, but as an older person I can say that I heard similar things in the 1960s about classical music dying or being dead and they didn't happen.
I use my experience of playing and singing early music (mostly medieval styles) to create new settings of ancient saga material - new music with old instruments. People who wouldn't normally go to hear a 12C harp and a classical voice hear something different at a local festival and become insterested - it's fun to do and even more fun to chat with audiences about what's involved. I'm nearly seventy and embrace new ways of working - I never liked the old ways to start with!
Something related to what you were is the lack of willingness from classical music people. I want to get into opera singing, and during research on their technmiques and stuff I alays find myself feeling that the writer is trying to look at me from over a platform or something.
Like, when I was looking info for a Do in Petto, one of the articles I read was talking about how "opera and mofdern music shouldn't mix", and that "arias shouldn't be sung with modern style singing even if it's sung properly". The writer talked about how this great modern style singer sung an aria in modern style and it was "like a screech to their ears" even though it was sung superbly. I read it and immediatly thought "yep, this is why opera is dying".
It makes me wonder if the writers of these sort of articles forget people in the opera sing that way, with over enphasis on things like squillo, chiaroscuro contrast, the glottal expansion and so on because back then there weren't microphones and they played this songs for large crowds of people to hear.
Like, I would bet anything that, had they had mics as we do today, they would have sung in what we call "modern style singing".
I think you made a good point here...while I am no real afficiando for opera, I do enjoy the music...but that HEAVY vibrato singing style, that, like you said, was a necessity back in the day, sounds absolutely ridiculous in this day and age imho. Its the sort of thing that you make fun of when youre 4...and when youre 40! With all due respect to the craft and the years of practice and refinement it takes to master this historically informed performance style, something just shuts down in my acceptance of it...even if I can enjoy the music, the story, the sets, the premise, etc, I just would rather hear the arias and recitatives performed with a more pure tone and the vibrato used more tastefully and to better effect if kept in check...imagine a voice with the purity of a Sarah McLaughlin or Sting singing these parts, and that's what I would prefer in modern opera at least anyway...otherwise, give me Glass's Einstein on the Beach or The Who's Tommy or Pink Floyd's The Wall as opera