Re: Saving Orchestras


[ Follow Ups ] [ Post Followup ] [ TubeNet BBS ] [ FAQ ]

Posted by jeff miller on May 04, 2003 at 18:31:59:

In Reply to: Saving Orchestras posted by Ryan W. Schultz on May 04, 2003 at 17:41:07:

This is hardly a comprehensive answer, but I think the grassroots of live music (including, but not limited to, classical music) in a society comes from exposing people from a very young age to live musicians playing live music on actual instruments. I do a fair number of educational projects working with children aged 3 to 16, and am amazed (and distressed) that many of them do not seem to realise that music comes from human beings in the same way that milk comes from cows and fruit comes from trees.

Many people in society today regard music as a consumable product which is presented to them in a pre-processed packaged format, much like a candy bar or plastic-wrapped piece of fruit. They don't give much (if any) thought to where the product actually came from, what it's made of, or how it managed to get to them in the first place. More importantly, many poeple don't think about what is needed to allow music to continue to exist and develop. Increasingly, people think that if they press the right button on the right machine, music will always come out, like a 7-11 Slurpee.

I am not lambasting or blaming these people; the onus is on us as musicians to carry our craft and our knowledge to others and introduce them to what we do. As much as I hate to admit it, it is up to us as musicians to drive the continuation of live music in society today. Governments and philanthropic organisations will not provide funding unless people ask for it. Businesses will not sponsor it unless they see a demand or are given tax credits for it. People will not demand live music unless they know enough about it to distinguish it from the vapid crap that is created to satisfy pre-existing conceptions of what is desired by the public.

There is no multi-national coorporation hiring advertising services to make people realise that they need live music - ultimately, it is up to us, musicians, to attempt to do this.

Let me ask anyone reading this post: how many times have you gone to a school or other civic gathering to do a demonstration performance? Have you ever taken an instrument to a school and gone from classroom to classroom, just to let the kids see, hear, and try it?

I know many of us do these sorts of things to try and drum up students or audiences for ourselves, or possibly just to make a few bucks. I think if we look further down the road, we will realise that we don't just need to be promoting ourselves; we need to be actively promoting music as a living artform.

If we don't do this, we will have no-one to blame for the demise of live music but ourselves.

Thanks for reading this, if you made it this far.

Tell your friends.

Jeff Miller


Follow Ups: