Donald Satz wrote:

>It's not an issue of overall popularity, but the fact that advertisers and
>sponsors key on the 18 to 34 age bracket.  Whatever most appeals to that
>age grouping gets top priority.  It's almost as if these folks think that
>once you get beyond 34 years of age, you don't buy anything.  Manipulation
>of young adults works much better than with the older population which
>knows junk when it sees it.

I don't disagree with the basic premise Don gives, but I think it's also
more complicated than that.  Sure, the younger crowd for the most part
doesn't listen to classical music very much in relation to other genres,
but then I'm not sure they listen as much as they did once did to the stuff
on the blandified playlists generated by the big media conglomerates who
own more and more radio stations in the US.  You know, the ones where the
"local" DJs are actually hundreds of miles away, phoning in their "local"
chatter.

Perhaps they should get on with being truthful and call it National Pop
Radio.....

And isn't it ironic that it's the 18-34 age bracket (perhaps tilted toward
the younger end of that spectrum) that's supposed to be the demographic
death of classical music, yet is also seen as posing a great danger to the
financial viability of the recordings business? After all, don't they not
BUY disks from the store anymore, but download and burn their own copies
for free instead?

Bill H.