{"id":13266,"date":"2013-09-05T11:50:38","date_gmt":"2013-09-05T15:50:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/?p=13266"},"modified":"2014-03-15T17:56:40","modified_gmt":"2014-03-15T21:56:40","slug":"popularizing-the-classics-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/?p=13266","title":{"rendered":"Popularizing the Classics"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>by Sedgwick Clark<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In a thought-provoking article in the August 25th issue of <em>The New Republic<\/em>, Philip Kennicott addresses the crisis of American orchestras. \u201cHow an effort to popularize classical music undermines what makes orchestras great,\u201d reads the deck. What exactly does\u00a0\u201cpopularize\u201d mean, and what will it undermine?<\/p>\n<p>Is it \u201cpopularization\u201d for the New York Philharmonic\u00a0to play two pre-subscription season\u00a0film-music programs in tandem with the films &#8212; the first being excerpts from five Hitchcock films (8\/17 &amp; 18) and the second a complete showing of Stanley Kubrick\u2019s\u00a0<em>2001: A Space Odyssey <\/em>with Alan Gilbert conducting the classical foreground score (8\/20 &amp; 21)?\u00a0Or is popularization driving Carnegie Hall\u2019s opening-night mix (10\/2) with the Philadelphia Orchestra under Yannick N\u00e9zet-Seguin: classical bon-bons\u00a0by Tchaikovsky, Saint-Sa\u00ebns, and Ravel,\u00a0with Josh Bell as soloist, followed by Esperanza Spalding in new arrangements for double bass from her latest CD?\u00a0Or would\u00a0orchestral arrangements of pop music be attempts at popularization?\u00a0Well, of course they are, and what of it? Did members of the Philharmonic sully their artistry when they moonlighted in Bernstein\u2019s Deutsche Grammophon recording of <em>West Side Story<\/em>? No comment necessary.<\/p>\n<p>All I know is that I plan to go to the pre-season NYPhil concerts because I love those films and their music, and that won\u2019t stop me from going to several of the orchestra\u2019s subscription concerts if I like the programs.\u00a0I especially look forward to hearing the Hitchcock cuts in full orchestral dress. My major concern is whether the Philharmonic gets good copies of the films. Several years ago, John Williams led a concert of his film music at the Phil, and the film sources were washed out and grainy. (I was told when I complained to management that he brought his own films, tailored for the concert.) I\u2019ll go to the Carnegie opening too, enjoy the \u201cclassical\u201d selections\u00a0of the program, and (if deadline permits) maybe even stick around for the Esperanza Spalding\u00a0part.\u00a0But I don\u2019t think I\u2019ll be attending a complete Spalding concert or the Philly playing arrangements of Bruce Springsteen hits. New Jersey Governor Christie can have my seat if that ever happens.<\/p>\n<div id=\"wp_fb_like_button\" style=\"margin:5px 0;float:none;height:34px;\"><script src=\"http:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/all.js#xfbml=1\"><\/script><fb:like href=\"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/?p=13266\" send=\"false\" layout=\"standard\" width=\"450\" show_faces=\"false\" font=\"arial\" action=\"like\" colorscheme=\"light\"><\/fb:like><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Sedgwick Clark In a thought-provoking article in the August 25th issue of The New Republic, Philip Kennicott addresses the crisis of American orchestras. \u201cHow an effort to popularize classical music undermines what makes orchestras great,\u201d reads the deck. What exactly does\u00a0\u201cpopularize\u201d mean, and what will it undermine? Is it \u201cpopularization\u201d for the New York [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13266"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13266"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13266\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16382,"href":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13266\/revisions\/16382"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13266"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13266"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13266"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}