Classical Music institutions, programmers, and artists have to struggle with the general perception that the genre is boring, elitist and not worthy of mass consumption. I generally disagree with these statements, but obviously many marketing professionals working in the area are not helping much to dispel these myths. In these visually driven times, how you present your content has become as important as the content itself. I am afraid many cultural institutions could learn a lesson or two from pop culture.
I agree with much of what the person writes. I have a son who does design and I know he’s looked at some things I’ve brought home and wondered what is UP with us.
I wonder too. 🙁
WARNING: Gratuitous Plug for Winchester Orchestra follows…
They often include graphical displays during their performances, which don’t detract in any way (I believe the principal horn player is responsible, but they’re still cool – go figure :).
One of the times I did Iolanthe up at Stanford they made a poster that was so cool one of my co-workers (I was working at a gas station at the time) asked if he could have it – as I recall, it was a scowling chancellor with a wee fairy (a la Tinkerbell) facing him, but that was over 30 years ago (much less 30 minutes) so I could be misrememberificating…
Thanks! I am currently writing another post on the subject of Classical Music and how it is presented to the public. It’s not just design that’s lacking, it’s an overall lack of embrace of new tools of dissemination as well.
I agree! Design is one aspect, but there are so many other problems. We just seem … I dunno … stuck in our ways, I suppose. Except when we’re not. And then we usually try something new that fails miserably. Go figure.
Ok, dredging back through the sludge of my memory it was perhaps only 25 years ago, give or take, that I first did Iolanthe at Stanford (did I mention how I don’t remember stuf…uh, what were we talking about?). Anyhoo, to tie into another post on the blog, how many people even notice the impact of “classical” music on their movie experience? Shucks, that’s not a reasonable question, since they’re not supposed to notice, exactly, but at least I (along with, I suspect, other musicians) notice (maybe not the first time I see something, but eventually…).
And I guarantee that people would find many movies much less interesting/compelling/whatever without the orchestral track.
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