BSO podcasts
I’m sure the Boston Symphony didn’t mean to fan the flames with this announcement, but the orchestra will now be offering a free podcast that features video lectures about its two-year Beethoven/Schoenberg series. As reported in PlaybillArts, the short videos (one to five minutes for the concentration-impaired) will discuss important works by each composer and be illustrated with appropriate artwork as well as images of scores, video and music clips. Good idea. Will it help gather new disciples? Probably not. Who, besides people who already know about Schoenberg and Beethoven, are searching for them in the iTunes store?
Footnote: I thought a lot about composing an insightful riposte to this example of an attitude that isn’t winning classical music any new supporters opinion, but decided against it because rather than make people feel small for expressing their opinions, I think it’s important to listen to what everyone has to say—even if you don’t happen to agree with them. Plus, it’s a debate that’s already made the rounds (click here, here, here, here, and here to get up to speed).
Update: Patti Mitchell composes a thoughtful response to the comment cited by ACD.
Update #2: Thanks to ACD for clarifying his reasons for offering his honest opinion about a reader’s honest opinion and my TAFTO contribution, which was done, he informs us, in the spirit of “pointing out the truth” despite it being “a less than pleasant affair.” ACD holds that “if you fail to get ‘em very young, you mostly don’t get ‘em at all.” I can agree with that—to an extent. On a personal level, I did not grow up listening to classical music. I grew up listening to 1950s rock and roll, country music, heavy metal, progressive rock, and then jazz, before finally getting into classical music. Although I wasn’t exposed to classical music at a young age, I still turned out as a classical music lover. I guess I’m an example of why ACD includes the qualifier “mostly” in the statement “you mostly don’t get ‘em at all” [italics mine]. My question is, what does that mean for “most” people who were not exposed to classical music at a young age? Are they simply lost causes, who’ve been hopelessly corrupted by the ills of society? Should we just round them up and ship them off to an island where they won’t pass on their “iPod Generation” genes to any offspring so that we can (finally) begin to cultivate an appropriately cultured society? I think this has been tried once already.
Update #3: Please see this important correction.
Final addenda: ACD responds (scroll down to the bottom) to SLN’s Update #2.