Klarinet Archive - Posting 000253.txt from 2000/07

From: "David B. Niethamer" <dnietham@-----.edu>
Subj: Re: [kl] Re: Developing audiences for music (Was: A review)
Date: Thu, 6 Jul 2000 08:34:11 -0400

on 7/4/00 7:25 PM, Andrea Bergamin wrote:

>I've the videos of 6 lessons held by Bernstein with his orchestra to a young
>audience. The children are very bored and I don't think that all of them are
>in our audience today.

In fact, in an article called "Resuscitating Art Music" by John Steinmetz
(once stored on Sneezy - is it there still?) Steinmetz offers the
information that the children who were in the audience for Bernstein's
concerts were bored, and fidgety from having to sit very still through
the taping as well as a significant amount of time beforehand, and are
not likely to be in the classical music audience today. Those who got to
watch it on TV (on their own terms, more or less) are more likely to be
classical concert goers today.

I don't remember where he got his statistics, but the article is a very
fascinating look at classical music, and what we have to do to make it
appealing to audiences today. Steinmetz's approach doesn't include
"dumbing down", either. If it's still on Sneezy, I'd suggest making the
effort to download it and read it.

During the past year, the Richmond Symphony has been engaged in a
self-study which has included examining the artistic product, and
discussing ways to make it better. One of the conclusions that our board
has reached (with a little guidance from the rank and file in the
orchestra) is that better concerts (including sufficient rehearsals,
appropriate venues, etc.) of the repertoire we do best (which has a
certain basic core, but is subject to expansion as it seems appropriate)
are ones which will also likely sell better. This is especially true if
the marketing folks can figure out what it is that is appealing about an
orchestra, and market what we do, as opposed to figuring out what will
sell, and trying to get us to do it. To the marketing people, this was a
novel concept.

It's a sticky issue. Organizations can't completely ignore the economic
realities of the business, but they do need to "keep their eye on the
ball", and remember that an orchestra is (in western countries at least)
a part of their cultural identity. Figuring out how to make this
meaningful and attractive to people who might otherwise not be inclined
to attend such concerts treads a fine line between pandering to the
lowest common denominator and the sort of elitist snobbery that has
gotten us into trouble in the first place.

David

David Niethamer
Principal Clarinet, Richmond Symphony
dnietham@-----.edu
http://members.aol.com/dbnclar1/

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Unsubscribe from Klarinet, e-mail: klarinet-unsubscribe@-----.org
Subscribe to the Digest: klarinet-digest-subscribe@-----.org
Additional commands: klarinet-help@-----.org
Other problems: klarinet-owner@-----.org