Can’t Afford “Beautiful” Classical Music
January 19th, 2006 by jenh
Greg Sandow ponders why the classical music world fails to attract “young” audiences. He claims that advertising in classical music falsely believes that the word “beautiful” will entice 20- to 40-year-olds. “‘Beautiful,’ at best, means not much more than ‘pretty,’ these days,” Sandow writes, “and music that only can be called beautiful would seem pretty empty. How about thoughtful music, challenging music, ambiguous music, wry music? Or even troubled music, conflicted music, since all these words might show up in some description of smart alternative bands.”
I wonder how my students would respond if I asked them to describe what “beautiful” music sounds like, or if they even like to listen to “beautiful” music. If I played them some examples of “beautiful” classical music, would they all recognize it as “beautiful” or be able to state why it is “beautiful”?
As for classical music having a hard time attracting a “young” audience, it’s much more than lame adverstising. How about the lack of tickets for under $20?