Author: ChrisArcand
Date: 2007-07-24 15:15
I've had this interesting thought for a while now.
There are two main branches which go to my thought:
1) Recently I've been meeting lots of people (aka music majors) coming to study at the University of Minnesota as I am, and talking with them about living here in Minneapolis has been incredibly interesting. I've lived in Minneapolis (or, rather, a very close suburb) for my entire life. So, it's been interesting to try and imagine a student looking at the skyline thinking "Whoa, I know nothing about this place and I'm going to live here"
Anyways, my main point about the above paragraph is summed up here: As I was talking with a buddy from Bismarck about the city and specifically, Orchestra Hall, I realized suddenly, "You've never seen the Minnesota Orchestra, have you? You've never even heard of Orchestra Hall?" (I then proceeded to say that I'm going to get him to a concert within the first week of school.)
That made me think: I'm a lucky guy. I've been seeing one of the top five orchestras perform since I was around 10 or something. My question is, what's it like NOT living by a major orchestra? It just seems almost odd to me. Please understand that I'm not sneering at anyone like "Ohhh I think the ONLY way to go is to live in Minneapolis, Boston, Philadelphia, New York or Cleveland." I'm just really extremely curious.
Which brings me to my other "branch", which I would ask PLEASE do not make this the main point of this thread.
2) The slow death of classical music and professional orchestral playing is a topic often talked about, everywhere in the music world. I've often wondered how things can look so optimistic to some, and yet so horribly "Don't you dare even think of making a living playing music, it's hopeless" My thought is this: Since I've lived in such a musical city, it's been almost confusing seeing the city around me look not nearly as horrible as what some people claim the music world is. Are regional orchestras and whatnot really dropping like flies everywhere but the cities I mentioned above? Disclaimer - Believe me, don't think that I'm trying to convince everyone that classical music isn't losing and has lost quite a bit of it's power and appeal to general people. I realize that it really is dying quite a bit.
Please, anyone who comments (and I would really like to hear from people), don't turn this thread into a "Let's talk about the death of music and go get a real job" thread, there's enough of those; I'm really interested in the "I don't live in Minneapolis/New York/Boston etc" talk. I mentioned the talk of the decline of music simply because it was another thought mixed in with my main idea.
CA
PS: As you can see, I'm at work with nothing to do :-D
PPS: One more little thought that just came to me: I guess I'm also pretty lucky because as I was auditioning at various schools across the east coast, I was fortunate enough to see almost all of the major american city-based orchestras, including all that I've mentioned in this thread, minus Boston. So don't think I'm a "Minnesota Orchestra rules all" sort of guy.
PPPS: I've never been to the west coast.
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