Peter Varley replies to my question about the ubiquity of listeners'
awareness of contemporary works in the late 19th century:

>The third series of lectures was on contemporary music.

And is this not the case today as well? There's a great deal written
and spoken about contemporary music if one is willing to look for it.
That availability implies nothing whatsoever about how widespread that
knowledge is.  One might extrapolate from your conclusion that a century
from now, sociomusicologists will conclude that this was a golden age for
contemporary composers, because of the enormous amount of their music
available on CD.  Surely *everyone* must have been aware of it!

len.