A film about classical music in unusual venues

The End of New Music - Free Speech Zone - Music - Column - New York Times, 7/04/07: "The film ['The End of New Music] documents a 2005 tour of rock clubs and alternative spaces by Free Speech Zone, a collective founded by Mr. Greenstein, David T. Little and Missy Mazzoli. In it, these three busy, highly regarded composers, whose boisterous, attractive music is influenced by neo-Romanticism, Minimalism and rock, forcefully reject the standard conventions of concert halls and academia....

“The main thing is understanding that you can actually take control over the way that your music is heard,” Mr. Greenstein said. 'Once you see that you had that power all along, then it suddenly doesn’t become ‘you versus the system’ anymore. It’s just you behaving as an adult, going out and making decisions in the world.'"

The blurring of genres

Bang on a Can - Music - Review - New York Times, 6/5/07: "When Bang on a Can was founded, the purpose was to provide a home for music by Mr. Gordon, Mr. Lang, Ms. Wolfe and their colleagues: an eclectic post-Minimalism that openly acknowledged an indebtedness to rock, jazz and a variety of world-music idioms. Two decades later these composers still haven’t entirely entered the concert-music mainstream. Still, this year’s marathon indicated that they may have achieved something even more meaningful.

It wasn’t just that contemporary-classical adherents shared space with alt-rock fans here. Rather, what seemed clear was that Bang on a Can has played a central role in fostering a new kind of audience that doesn’t concern itself with boundaries among new-music composition, the pianist Vijay Iyer’s sophisticated modern jazz, the Uzbek folk ensemble Mashriq’s eloquent meditations and innovative post-rock experimentation from groups like he Books, Clogs and D�lek. The prevailing tone was that if music is made with originality and integrity, these listeners will come."

Classical music in non-traditional venues

The pioneer cellist - baltimoresun.com: "The first time Matt Haimovitz took the stage at the late and lamented New York club CBGB, where the Talking Heads and the Ramones got their first big boosts, he didn't feel entirely welcome.

'I was sandwiched between four or five punk bands, and I could feel a little resistance,' the Israeli-born, Montreal-based Haimovitz says of that night in 2002. 'I think the audience came to see if I would survive.'

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The unease wasn't surprising -- CBGB hadn't ever presented a classical cellist.

'I played one Bach suite,' Haimovitz says, 'and I could tell the bands were like, 'OK, kid, get lost,' But I wanted to stay as long as I could. I played another Bach suite, and then another.'

Haimovitz kept on going, even throwing in the world premiere of a piece written for him, before launching into his grand finale, his own arrangement of the legendary Jimi Hendrix version of the national anthem. The cellist won the day.

It has been like that most of the time since Haimovitz, 36, decided to branch out from the more traditional environs of classical music about seven years ago. ...

'...300 people were crammed in a room while there was a battle of the bands, heavy metal version, on the floor below. It was louder than anything I ever heard, but the people just focused in on my cello. It really showed the power of this music to withstand anything.'"

The New Music Scene in NYC

Combining classical influences with experimental music and even pop and rock, these music groups are probably more indie/hip/cool than can be found in most hipster clubs.

Club Acts: Musical Events: The New Yorker: "Forty years ago, New York had just two full-time new-music ensembles: the Contemporary Chamber Ensemble and the Group for Contemporary Music. Now there are more than forty such outfits, from Alarm Will Sound to Wet Ink. Although these groups sometimes play in the uptown concert halls, they more often appear downtown and in Brooklyn....
"An exceptionally vital group of young composers is driving the proliferation of new music. As they pontificate on blogs and Web sites such as Sequenza21 and NewMusicBox, distribute music via MySpace pages and Internet radio, and post flyers for their shows, they act for all the world like unsigned rockers trying to make it in the city.... Classifying their work becomes tricky; many composers of Tignor’s generation are erasing the line between classical and pop, dispensing with performers in favor of laptops, incorporating improvisation and world-music practices, or singing their own art songs in semi-pop style. Complicating the picture further is a new breed of pop artist who composes on the side....
"Sometimes the blurring of boundaries leads to overamplified mush. Just as often, though, it generates a new kind of interstitial music—one that makes a virtue of falling between the cracks....
"Since George Gershwin’s time, people have been talking about a total synthesis of pop and classical traditions. Such a fusion is probably as undesirable as it is unattainable: genre distinctions are part of what makes music comprehensible in the first place. Nonetheless, all music exists on a continuum, and it’s thrilling when a programmer decides to follow a common thread from one genre to another....
"Everyone has something to gain from this exercise. Classical types can expose their wares to a new crowd: the youthful-intellectual demographic that classical presenters often talk about but seldom attract. At the same time, the so-called “pop” artists—none of them remotely of the Top Forty variety—can enjoy an atmosphere free of background chatter and clinking beer bottles. Listeners benefit the most; they experience familiar repertory from new angles or discover music that they otherwise might have missed."

Bringing younger audiences to the arts

This article has a number of excellent ideas about how to reach young adults.

Arts groups creating ways to lure young audiences - Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 2/25/07

Here are some of the ideas mentioned:

1. Gallery crawls, which are pitched to 20-to-40-year -olds and offer hors d'oeuvres and music in addition to art.

2. Making sure people know you don't have to dress up to attend the theater and classical music concerts.

3. Bringing in young professionals as volunteers to help various arts organizations.

4. Offering affordable tickets.

5. Combining theater events with a pre-show cocktail party.

6. Promoting events via email, websites, radio, and word-of-mouth, not just through more traditional methods like newspapers, billboards, and posters.

creative class
classical music
Pittsburgh

Technology to market the arts

Cultural historian Siva Vaidhyanathan talks about using technology to reach new audiences for opera. Here's an excerpt, but read the whole article to see what he says about whether opera and other cultural offerings should receive government support or be at the mercy of the marketplace.

1/27/07, Playbill Features: The [New] Rules of Engagement: "EP: The Met is actively using technology to move the operatic art form forward. What are the challenges?

SV: The challenge is to empower your potential audience to engage in conversation. Delivery is no longer enough. It's important to have web sites with commentary so people can engage in conversations, sites that keep people apprised of new events and trends. No matter where you're sitting in the world, you should feel a part of the Metropolitan Opera.

The big challenge with connecting to new audiences all over the world is to make them feel part of the process, and not that they are merely passive recipients. That might mean encouraging people to remix materials. Or to release video clips in a format that might allow this technological remixing.

Culture is conversation. It is an argument over time. And sometimes you can get heated, and sometimes people just break into song and dance, and that's the beauty of it. But those are the risks you take, and as more and more cultural institutions realize that that is how culture works — in a circle rather than in a line — the more relevant they will remain."

internet marketing
classical music

Why does opera have to be stuffy?

This is a good idea. I'm not an opera fan myself, but on the other hand I do like the current crop of performers (e.g., Dresden Dolls) who are very theatrical and draw inspiration from 20th century European opera-influenced cabaret.

Opera Boston brings 'informal cabaret' to the Lizard Lounge - The Boston Globe: "On Jan. 17 at the Lizard Lounge in Cambridge, the company inaugurates Opera Boston Underground, which it calls 'an informal, themed opera cabaret.' Appropriately, its first show will be 'Kurt Weill's World,' songs written and inspired by a composer whose music bridged high art and popular sensibility as well as any in the 20th century.

"'I think many young people feel that opera is expensive and stuffy,' wrote Opera Boston general director Carole Charnow in an e-mail earlier this week. 'Opera Boston Underground is primarily a fun night out where young people can experience opera in a place where they're already comfortable -- their local bar or club. It will be set up a bit like a jazz gig -- with an improvisational feel, and there's a set where singers from the audience can join in.'"

clubs
classical music

Musicians and community outreach

Here's a program that recognizes that thriving local music scenes depend on not just talent but having musicians become active members of the community. If you want fans to feel involved and to support music and musicians, you need to give them relationships.

Carnegie Hall - Julliard - Report - New York Times

"Called the Academy, the program, run by Carnegie Hall and Juilliard, is a performance and education initiative for postgraduate musicians. In the first phase of this program, which begins on Jan. 7, 16 musicians will become resident artists at Carnegie Hall, where they will perform concerts and undergo additional professional training. They will also take master classes and study at Juilliard.

"In addition the Academy will collaborate closely with the New York City Education Department to develop the teaching skills of these high-powered players, who, during this pilot phase, will each spend one and a half days working in one of the 16 public schools across the city that have been selected so far. When fully in effect, the Academy will involve two-year fellowships for some 50 aspiring professional musicians....

"Through this program talented musicians on the brink of a career will be chosen as resident artists at Carnegie Hall and the Juilliard School, America’s most prestigious concert hall and most prestigious conservatory, not because they have won fancy competitions or secured professional management, but because they are willing to work in public schools in New York....

"Joseph W. Polisi, the president of the Juilliard School] said in a recent interview that he envisioned an orchestra with such a vibrant presence in the community — with members so involved in teaching and taking music to schools and community centers — that 'citizens will feel it is unthinkable that this ensemble would go out of business.'"

New York
classical music
music scene
economic development
creative class

Target marketing works to promote a performing arts center

Most failing music venues haven't done a good job of marketing themselves (bad locations and poor business practices are other contributing factors).

Here's an example of a performing arts venue that is using sophisticated tools, some of which might be adaptable to a broader spectrum of music. Of course, a rock club that brings in a wide variety of bands, not all of them good, may find it harder to presell tickets than an opera company that is staging a known performance which will play multiple nights.

Still, music venues do need to consider all "best practices" if they hope to survive.

Arts center sings multichannel tune: "The Brooklyn Academy of Music is the nation's oldest continuously operating performing arts center, with its first season in 1861.

"What does a 145-year-old theater have to do with online sales and marketing? Surprisingly, it employs some of the most cutting-edge technologies around, including video, thanks to a recent upgrade to its e-commerce site....

"The academy's facilities include a 2,000-seat opera house, a 900-seat theater, art house movie theaters as well as a cafe and a retail store....

"Besides video marketing, BAM has had success with e-mail. Its 80,000-customer database includes 40,000 opt-in e-mail addresses, acquired through the bam.org e-commerce site or at a kiosk in the theater's lobby.

"'We have a very low unsubscribe rate,' [said Stephen Litner, senior manager of marketing for BAM.] 'Our click rates are 7 percent, and our open rates are 30 percent.'

"E-mail newsletters about planned performances are sent weekly. Additional e-mails on upcoming performances go to customers based on their preferences. And because these e-mails are so targeted, they have an even higher open rate than the weekly newsletters. E-mails offering discounts are used only to acquire customers, because BAM does not want to train customers to depend on coupons."

New York
classical music
live music
clubs
music promotion

Taking classical music to hipster venues like dive bars

Here's an excellent article about putting classical music in non-traditional venues. I've only excerpted just a bit of it, but check out the whole article to find out the reasons why people are doing this and what the successes and challenges have been.

Musical America - Classical Music Meets the Alternative Scene: "Spurred on by a growing number of offbeat performance venues and enterprising young classical musicians, New York is experiencing a boom in small, largely below-the-radar concert series. There are opera nights at a Lower East Side dive bar, chamber music concerts at a boxing gym beneath the Brooklyn Bridge, contemporary music at a cabaret in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and avant-garde fare in a silo on the banks of an industrial canal....

"Gleason's, a legendary boxing gym where fighters like Jake LaMotta, Muhammad Ali and Roberto Duran trained, will host its second concert by the International Street Cannibals, a chamber ensemble comprised of prominent New York freelancers, on Dec. 2. Boxers spar in one ring as musicians perform in another....

"SpiegelTent, a vintage European traveling tent that set up shop at the former Fulton Fish Market in August and September, presented string quartet Ethel, violinist and composer Daniel Bernard Roumain and the S.E.M. Ensemble (all programmed by Zach Layton of Darmstadt)."

live music
clubs
New York
classical music
music promotion