Sam Kemp:

>Presumably this is why many programmes prefer to mix 20th Century music
>with popular classics - a recent example being Simon Rattle's combination
>of Beethoven's 5th Symphony (I think) with the suite from Berg's "Lulu". I
>imagine this is good for the box office, as the popular item lures people
>in, but is it good for the music?

I don't understand the down side.

>Would you prefer to visit a concert where the music was of one particular
>style in order that it is effectively guaranteed that the audience want to
>hear the music and do not shuffle restlessly, or one that mixed the two in
>the hope that people would be surprised by how good some more "difficult"
>music is?

Concerts mix styles all the time:  for example, a Mozart overture,
followed by a Beethoven concerto, and ending with a Brahms symphony.
That doesn't seem to me unusual - unimaginative, perhaps, but not unusual.
As for people shuffling restlessly with Horrid Modern Music:  right now, a
good deal of the musical public is so unadventurous that they will shuffle
restlessly if they don't recognize the name of the composer.  This includes
not only Ruggles, Carter, and Berg, but Nielsen, Barber, and Vaughan
Williams.  Most of this music is 30-90 years old.  It seems to me that its
relegation to specialists is one of the worst things that has happened to
music in general.  Pathologically conservative programming helps absolutely
nobody in the long run - not the listener, not the composer, not the
performer, not the concert organization.  As far as I'm concerned,
Koussevitzky provided the model of audience building:  a conductor of
genius in the standard repertoire as well as in the contemporary, he
committed himself not only to first performances, but to seconds and
thirds.

Perhaps the difficult music of this century will always be a minority
taste, like bel canto opera, although I must say that in New Orleans I've
always been surprised by what audiences will like and dislike.  I've heard
enthusiasm for Schoenberg and complaints against Beethoven from people not
especially well-versed in classical music.  Perhaps a little learning is
indeed a dangerous thing.

Steve Schwartz