Richard Tsuyuki wrote:

>In my experience, there are enormous differences between popular and
>classical music concerts.  Popular music concerts depend on a (perceived
>or real) direct, personal connection between the performer(s) and the
>audience members, and among the audience members - a sense of common,
>group experience.  I believe this feeling far outweighs the choice of
>programming and has more to do with performer charisma and image,
>atmosphere, and complex sociological stuff like group identification
>(demographics), (implicit) political/philosophical climate, etc.
>Incidentally, I think if one fully understood this difference, one would
>go a long way toward understanding the apparent decline in popularity
>of classical music.

Actually there has been a great deal written about this.  I am currently
reading two books on the subject.

I believe that the recording has ultimately caused musicians to be less
expressive in their performance.  I believe many feel they are under
pressure to make it "sound like the recording." To my ears...not the
same for everyone to be sure...a concert should be more like a baseball
game...you know the rules (the notes) but the plays and the drama will
be different everytime...however, unlike the baseball gave, the "score"
remains the same.

As for the possible decline in interest in art music, while I believe
it is a complex issue...and I do sense (no statistical information to
support it) that there is a decline, and that perhaps some of the factors
you mention may be appropriate to the discussion, however, for me, art
music is not the same as popular music, for I believe art music has
different goals.

Karl