Saturday, October 10, 2015

Get into the Elevator with Webern

What We Hate Now, apparently, and some fairly dodgy assertions as to why:



One could say a lot about the fundamental assumptions underlying this study, but for now let's just say that if they're going to do studies like this, they really need to do them in Sociology Departments that actually know something about music.

Questionable notions resulting in the conflation of "folk" (whatever that is) and "country" (whenever that is) aside, one thing orchestra marketing departments might learn from this odd little exercise is to ditch this absurd idea that classical music can and should be marketed as "relaxing". Market it as what it is -- complex and awesome and all over the map -- and maybe you'll still have an audience in thirty years.

4 comments:

  1. The professor's accent was really hard to follow... I wonder if he's got one of those trendy beards. Anyway, very interesting, religious styles, eh? Surprising I'd say, but maybe it was a study on 2000 people with that chap's accent.

    I was in a co-worker's car the other day (I work with people for whom attending church is entertainement) and the music just burst out. She tried to turn it off but I actually liked it ;-) the tune, I mean. These fundies have really gone a long way to making their soft rock singalongs cool(er) to young people. Then again, I suppose 37 might not be that young anymore ;-)

    I'm confused, what does he think college students liked back in the day? I thought rap and metal were very common at college in the '90s. It's like everybody was listening to Korn and Tupac/Biggie (along with the singer songwriter du jour and Sleater Kinney), at least where I went. I think he's talking bollocks. Also he actually said irregardless! Haha, haven't heard that in a good while. Notre Dame's standards must be slipping.

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    Replies
    1. Do they do trendy beards at Notre Dame? Do they do anything trendy at Notre Dame?

      Yes, Christian Rock has come a long way from its supremely cheesy genesis. But "religious styles"? Which means what, Jars of Clay? Sister Rosetta Tharpe? Gyütö Monks? Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan? The Great Mass in C? What?

      He's also confused about the association of Country with right wing politics -- it's sort of bizarre to suggest that this began with the Iraq War. Seriously, was there no one involved in this study over the age of 25?

      And yes, you're right about the 90's, at least in the NE US. So I wonder where exactly the original study was done. You also have to wonder if, post-Napster, 2k people could possibly be looked on as a representative sample.

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  2. Hi Stray,

    I attended Aida at the Bavarian State opera where Jonas Kaufmann sang Radames. You can see the brand new curtain call pictures of him on my site which are not shown in google images.

    I've installed a firewall which stop other sites from displaying the content of my site in a frame. I see you don't get my new post. Can you list "operasora.blogspot.de" , instead operasora.eu, on your site?

    ReplyDelete