CLASSICAL
MUSIC IN AN AGE OF POP
Spring
2008
email me
website (soon to be updated)
course
overview
blog on the future of classical music
in-progress online book on the future of
classical music
Class
Schedule and Assignments
This schedule might change, depending on how long some of our
discussions take. Assignments might change, too, and there are some I haven’t
decided on yet. I’ll e-mail all updates, including any assignments that aren’t
yet on this sheet.
January 16
Introduction to this course
January 23
The
crisis in classical music
reading:
Greg
Sandow, Where We Stand: The Classical Music World Today (unpublished)
Allan
Kozinn, “Check the Numbers: Rumors
of Classical Music’s Demise are Dead Wrong” (from The New York Times, May 28, 2006)
Marcus
Westbury, “Mozart cover bands rake
in the moolah” (from the Sydney [Australia]
Morning Herald, October 18, 2007)
January 30
What is classical music?
reading:
Lawrence
Kramer, Why Classical Music Still
Matters, chapter 7, “Persephone’s Fiddle”
Christopher
Small, Musicking, chapter 1, “A Place for Hearing”
Kyle MacMillan, “Violinist Zukerman
decries sad state of classical music,” Denver
Post, November 15, 3007
assignment:
Informal paper—two or three pages—due by e-mail on
February 13. Describe your own
career (so far). Do you like working in classical music? Why? Does your work in
classical music give you creative freedom as a musician? If there are things
you don’t like about your work, is there any way you can change them?
Please
e-mail all written assignments to me at greg@gregsandow.com.
If you’re going to be late with an assignment — not recommended —absolutely let
me know in advance.
February 6
The crisis
in classical music — culture
reading:
Chris Lee, “The iPod
Philharmonic,” Los Angeles Times, December 9, 2007
February 13
Case study:
Classical music on public radio
informal paper about
your career is due.
reading:
David Finckel and Wu Han, “Classical Radio’s
Fade-Out” (The New York Times, April 20, 2002)
Samuel G. Freedman, “Public Radio’s
Private Guru” (New York Times, November 11, 2001)
assignment (for this
class):
What would you do if you ran a public radio station, and you
wanted to broadcast classical music? How would you get people to listen? How
could you reach the people Richard Florida describes? How could you reach John
Seabrook?
Read the assignments, think about these questions, and come
up with some ideas. Don’t worry if you can’t find perfect answers. These are
very hard questions, as you’ll see from the reading. So just try to think of a
few new things public radio stations could do, to attract new classical
listeners.
Come to class ready to present your ideas.
February 20
Classical music before it was classical (1)
reading:
James H. Johnson, Listening
in Paris, excerpt
from chapter 1, about Baroque opera in Paris
Some anecdotes about
performances in past centuries
listening:
February 27
Classical
music before it was classical (2)
reading:
Peter Gay, excerpt from The
Naked Heart: “The Art
of Listening”
listening:
TBA
March 5 - March 12: spring break
March 19
Pop Music
reading:
Peter
Guralnick, Sweet
Soul Music, excerpt
(about an Aretha Franklin recording session)
listen
to Aretha Franklin, “I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You)”
Lester
Bangs, “Astral
Weeks” (an example of rock criticism, from Greil
Marcus, ed., Stranded: Rock and Roll for
a Desert Island)
listen
to Van Morrison’s “Madame George”
read
the lyrics
Clive
Thompson, “Sex,
Drugs, and Updating Your Blog,” from the New York Times Magazine, May 13, 2007 (about how to promote a pop
career all by yourself, on the Web)
Robert
Walser, Running
with the Devil: Power, Gender, and Madness in Heavy Metal Music, excerpt (an example
of musicological writing about pop music)
listen
to Van Halen’s “Runnin’
with the Devil”
March 26
The problem
of new music
reading
Greg
Sandow, “How to
Attract a Young Audience” (blog post)
comment on new music and ticket sales, from the
marketing director of a major orchestra (who has to be anonymous)
programming
for WNYC’s “Evening Music” classical broadcast, starting March 3, when Terrance
McKnight took over as host and programmer (he broadcasts Mondays through
Thursdays)
listening
new music
in styles you might not hear in classical concert halls
Todd
Levin, Blur
orchestral
techno, with a Schoenberg tone row added to the mix
Michael
Gordon, “Light
is Calling,” from his album Light is
Calling
one of
the Bang on a Can composers creates music in a recording studio, as pop
musicians do
Osvaldo Golijov, The Passion According to St. Mark, conclusion (“Kaddish”)
Golijov’s
blend of classical music and world music
Jonny
Greenwood, Popcorn Superhet
Receiver, live performance at the Wordless Music orchestra concert, January
16, 2008, as broadcast on WNYC
Greenwood
is the lead guitarist of Radiohead, and also a composer. He was composer in
residence with the BBC in London. They commissioned and premiered this piece.
The Wordless Music performance was the American premiere. Greenwood wrote the
music for There Will Be Blood, and
included parts of this piece.
Go here to
WNYC’s website, scroll down till you find this piece, and click to listen.
April 2
Playing the
standard repertoire
listening:
Mahler, Adagietto
from the Fifth Symphony; Willem Mengelberg conducting
the Concertgebuow Orchestra (1926)
Beethoven,
Archduke Trio, first
movement; Alfred Cortot (piano), Jacques Thibaut (violin), Pablo Casals (cello) (1926)
Schubert,
“Serenade” (in
English); Richard Crooks, tenor (1941)
Guillaume
de Machaut, Messe de Notre Dame,
Gloria; Ensemble Organum (1996)
Bach,
Goldberg Variations, variation
28 to the end; Simone Dinnerstein (2007)
Beethoven,
Eroica Symphony, first movement;
Mikhail Pletnev conducting the Russian National
Orchestra (2007)
April 9
Fixing the
crisis — what has been done?
reading:
assignment (for this class):
Here are some things that
orchestras have tried, or talked about, to make concerts more accessible. Think
about these, and come to class prepared to say which you like, and which you
don’t like. And why, of course. If you have ideas of
your own, don’t hesitate to suggest them.
·
Showing the conductor and the
players on large video screens
·
Having the conductor or musicians
talk to the audience
·
Making program notes less
scholarly
·
Making the program book very
lively, like a well-edited magazine
·
Serving food and drinks in the
lobby before concerts
·
Having a band play in the lobby
before concerts
·
Having the musicians dress less
formally
·
Playing chamber music, early
music, or jazz or pop along with orchestral pieces
·
Making concerts shorter
·
Allowing the audience to go in and
out during performances
·
Showing videos or light shows to
illustrate or accompany the music
·
Encouraging the audience to
applaud between movements, or even while the music is playing
·
Setting up a booth in the lobby
where people who don’t usually go to concerts can ask questions
·
Inviting the audience to discuss
the music (and the performance!) after every concert, with musicians and
members of the orchestra staff
·
Inviting the audience (and anybody
else) to debate performances and discuss anything about the orchestra, on a
message board on the orchestra’s website
·
Having the musicians in the
orchestra leave the stage and talk individually to members of the audience,
after the performance of a contemporary piece
·
Having the music director and all
the musicians in the orchestra stand outside the concert hall before the first
concert of the season, to personally greet every member of the audience
·
Offering real-time commentary on
the music—program notes synchronized with the music—on hand-held devices
available to anyone in the audience
·
Doing more new music (to attract a
younger audience)
·
Doing three new works on a
program, and letting the audience vote on which one they like best
·
Inviting the audience to react to
premieres by taking sides in the lobby at intermission—everyone who liked the
piece would gather on the left, and everyone who hated it would gather on the
right
·
stream performances live to movie theaters, as the Metropolitan Opera does
·
invite the audience to comment and ask questions between pieces, or even
between movements
April 16
Fixing the
crisis: Bringing classical music to a new audience
reading:
three posts from
my blog:
three
introductions to familiar classical pieces, from the American Symphony
Orchestra League's now-defunct "Meet the Music" website:
Anne Midgette, “The Last
Hallelujah” (about Handel’s Messiah)
Joshua Kosman,
"How
You Like Me Now?" (about Prokofiev's
Violin Concerto No. 1)
Elena Park, "The Intimate
Ninth" (about Beethoven's Ninth)
listening:
"The Ring and I"
(introduction to Wagner's Ring, produced
and broadcast by WNYC, New York's public radio station).
April 23 – April 30
Fixing the
crisis — what you can do
assignment for these
two classes, to be presented informally in class:
Pick a piece that you’ve performed, and that you really
love. Come to class prepared to say why you love it. Imagine that you’re not
talking to musicians, or to people who already know classical music. Instead,
imagine that you’re talking to the new audience everybody wants to attract.
What would you say to get them interested in this music you love?
assignments due by
e-mail on May 16:
take-home exam, given
out in class and e-mailed to you.
informal three-page
paper:
Think about the new culture we talked and read about earlier
in the course. Look over the readings from John Seabrook and Richard Florida.
And now imagine that you’ve been asked to give a concert
that will attract the people Seabrook and Florida talk about. This can be a
solo recital or a chamber performance, and you can give it anywhere you like,
with one exception—you can’t give it for a captive audience, of the kind you’d
find at a school, for example, or a retirement home. You have to attract paying
customers.
Describe what you’d do. Where would you give the concert?
(It doesn’t have to be in a concert hall.) What music would you play? How would
you present the music? How would you interest the people described in the
readings, whose interests — whose whole way of life — is miles away from the
classical concert hall?
May 7: no class — jury week
May 14
Final
discussion
take-home exam due
informal paper due