|
Ruby2
|
 |
« Reply #135 on: 12:44:54, 29-08-2008 » |
|
I don't want to live in a world where the most important talents and skills in every field are entrepreneurship, salemanship and business enterprise. I want musicians, artists, doctors and scientists to be first and foremost musicians, artists, doctors and scientists - NOT salesmen, businessmen and consultants. (Those are not exclusive lists by the way). I want to be able to value what people do, not how they present or sell what they do. Public subsidy is (was) one way, admittedly not a perfect one, of trying to ensure that this is more likely.
I think this is a very good point, as often the most creative people are the least business-headed (of course I realise there are exceptions - probably those who have become successful). I do get irritated when I occasionally catch Dragon's Den and watch otherwise decent ideas being batted away because the inventor is stumbling over their figures. The band who recently applied and received funding on there made a brave and rather clever move I thought - cash and publicity - where else can you get those in one quick hit? It's like getting a public subsidy on the telly. |
|
|
|
« Last Edit: 12:47:04, 29-08-2008 by Ruby2 »
|
Logged
|
"Two wrongs don't make a right. But three rights do make a left." - Rohan Candappa
|
|
|
|
iwarburton
|
|
« Reply #136 on: 12:51:39, 29-08-2008 » |
|
HIAWATHA´S WEDDING FEAST - now that's what I call good music! But those fifth-columnists at the BBC, the blighters, have (cont p94)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Am not sure if this comment is serious or spoof. I have Sargent's version of HWF but, apart from the famous Onaway Awake Beloved, it strikes me as fairly forgettable.
Comments?
Ian.
|
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
|
|
|
|
Ian Pace
|
|
« Reply #137 on: 12:58:13, 29-08-2008 » |
|
Whilst 100% agreeing with you about Starbucks, strina (and I will never go in there for similar reasons), there is a point of view that does not see strong measures to prevent monopolies and cartels as necessarily being at cross-purposes with the aims of market capitalism. So it may be possible to oppose the Starbuckisation of the coffee world without negating the principle of letting the market decide. It's not my view, nor do I think it often actually works out in practice (indeed, the 'free market' is ideology, I would say, because it's artificially sustained by governments and militaries), but maybe one worth filtering into the debate.
|
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
'These acts of keeping politics out of music, however, do not prevent musicology from being a political act . . .they assure that every apolitical act assumes a greater political immediacy' - Philip Bohlman, 'Musicology as a Political Act'
|
|
|
|
George Garnett
|
|
« Reply #138 on: 12:58:36, 29-08-2008 » |
|
Who said that you shouldn't give the people what they want, you should give them what they didn't yet know they wanted? I've a funny feeling it was the Head of Marketing at Sony when they were about to launch the Walkman  . But maybe he wasn't the first. |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
|
|
|
|
...trj...
|
|
« Reply #139 on: 13:04:00, 29-08-2008 » |
|
I will not go to Starbucks for three reasons:
(1) I think their coffee is disgusting
It's worth mentioning at this juncture that this is precisely the reason Starbucks recently shut down almost all of their operations in Australia. The lesson to be drawn? Market forces can, in certain cases, work against bullying big business, as long as customers have the knowledge and/or skills necessary (in this case, Ozzies' refined taste for coffee) to make a properly informed choice. |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
|
|
|
|
richard barrett
|
|
« Reply #140 on: 13:06:10, 29-08-2008 » |
|
Dare I suggest that a contemporary music group should try the same thing? I'm sure I heard of a pub or cafe in London (possibly I saw it on the 'Classic Britannia' programme) which hosts contemporary music nights, in much the same way my local pub puts on garage rock bands, and managed to attract a large and demographically-varied audience. Maybe the audience for this type of music does exist and is just waiting to be catered to.
Actually a great deal of contemporary music, of the improvised variety, goes on in pubs, and at any given time there'll be about half a dozen venues in London which have more or less regular events of this kind ("Mopomoso" on the third Sunday of every month at the Vortex in Dalston is at the moment maybe the best-established one.) Audiences range from tiny to heaving. I do quite a lot of playing in this kind of context, once every couple of months on average maybe, and I find it quite inspiring both as musician and as listener: the contact between performers and audiences is much closer, the audiences tend to be supportive rather than exuding a kind of "tell me something I don't know" attitude, and of course the money is rubbish. The music is not subsidised. Improvised music is by its very nature "critical". |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
|
|
|
|
Ian Pace
|
|
« Reply #141 on: 13:21:15, 29-08-2008 » |
|
The music is not subsidised. Improvised music is by its very nature "critical". In the smaller venues it may not be, but many of the reputations of the most prominent practitioners in improvised music have come through their playing at subsidised European festivals. Here is a moderately interesting blog post on that topic. I really don't see how it necessarily follows that simply because some music is improvised, that it is automatically 'critical'. |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
'These acts of keeping politics out of music, however, do not prevent musicology from being a political act . . .they assure that every apolitical act assumes a greater political immediacy' - Philip Bohlman, 'Musicology as a Political Act'
|
|
|
|
Ron Dough
|
|
« Reply #142 on: 14:00:42, 29-08-2008 » |
|
Does the presence of Hello magazine make Ham Radio magazine unsustainable?
No, but it does establish a set of 'norms' outside which anything else is considered (if it be considered at all) as weird or eccentric, and therefore ghettoised. The very term 'elitism' might be viewed as such a ghettoisation. I’m willing to bet that even Hello magazine only sells to small percentage of the population, so in what sense does this represent a norm? There are so many minority interests that I feel fairly confident that the majority enjoy at least one or more minority interest. Do most people feel themselves to be weird, eccentric and ghettoised? But Hello magazine is one of the media manifestations of a culture which idolises 'celebs', most of whom have been created by the media in the first place. It's just one in a pool of generic magazines and TV magazine programmes which thrive on creating and perpetuating the these contemporary heroes, but a pretty successful one. You only have to pick up a discarded red-top on public transport or in the street to be aware that for many this is the pressing news: far more important than world events or political thought (let alone discussion), which get derisory coverage by comparison. |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
|
|
|
|
Ron Dough
|
|
« Reply #143 on: 14:43:37, 29-08-2008 » |
|
I’m willing to bet that even Hello magazine only sells to small percentage of the population, so in what sense does this represent a norm? There are so many minority interests that I feel fairly confident that the majority enjoy at least one or more minority interest. Do most people feel themselves to be weird, eccentric and ghettoised?
That's a question that should rightly be asked of someone in Hello's target age and social brackets but with radically different interests from its many readers, surely? And perhaps it needs slightly different wording. "Do such people feel themselves to be considered weird, eccentric and ghettoised?" Judging from the experience of one sixties Grammar School teenager who was more likely to be reading The Gramophone rather than N.M.E. or Melody Maker, I'd strongly suggest that the answer's "Yes". |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
|
|
|
|
Ruby2
|
|
« Reply #144 on: 14:53:32, 29-08-2008 » |
|
I’m willing to bet that even Hello magazine only sells to small percentage of the population, so in what sense does this represent a norm? There are so many minority interests that I feel fairly confident that the majority enjoy at least one or more minority interest. Do most people feel themselves to be weird, eccentric and ghettoised?
That's a question that should rightly be asked of someone in Hello's target age and social brackets but with radically different interests from its many readers, surely? And perhaps it needs slightly different wording. "Do such people feel themselves to be considered weird, eccentric and ghettoised?" Judging from the experience of one sixties Grammar School teenager who was more likely to be reading The Gramophone rather than N.M.E. or Melody Maker, I'd strongly suggest that the answer's "Yes". I used to work with an incredibly pleasant and bright consultant who for some reason was addicted to Hello. For that I certainly considered her weird, eccentric and... well not ghettoised. She lived in Knightsbridge. |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
"Two wrongs don't make a right. But three rights do make a left." - Rohan Candappa
|
|
|
|
increpatio
|
|
« Reply #145 on: 16:37:09, 29-08-2008 » |
|
Who said that you shouldn't give the people what they want, you should give them what they didn't yet know they wanted? I think it was henry ford "If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses." |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
|
|
|
|
richard barrett
|
|
« Reply #146 on: 17:08:33, 29-08-2008 » |
|
But bands that play in pubs etc. don’t do so because passing a hat round allows them to keep going. They keep going because they enjoy doing it - money or not. This doesn’t seem so true of ‘contemporary’ music groups.
I don't know about that. Playing contemporary compositions isn't a passport to riches either. What do you think is the reason that a considerable number of these groups still exist, against the financial odds (I'm not talking about the London Sinfonietta or Arditti String Quartet but less "mainstream" operations like Plus Minus, which as far as I know doesn't receive a regular subsidy)? Could it possibly be because they find the music they play has something to contribute to the world and they derive musical fulfilment from it, or aren't you prepared to accept that such is possible? There's a lot of cynicism and rigidity of thought going on here about this subject, and I just wanted to say (in no doubt a completely anti-critical sort of way) that the fundamental reason for me to do what I do as a musician is that I love it. I was listening to a recording of a recent performance the other evening and I absolutely loved it. (That doesn't mean I think in some pseudo-objective sense it's "any good" or "better than X" or "more critical than Y" by the way.) That's where it starts from and no amount of more-intellectual-than-thou posturing or populist scoffing can change that or take it away. I am not denying the importance here either of intellectual enquiry or musical communicability, I'm talking about where the music originates, that is to say in a desire besides which arguments about the fairness/unfairness of subsidised art look ridiculously unimportant. |
|
|
|
« Last Edit: 17:24:24, 29-08-2008 by richard barrett »
|
Logged
|
|
|
|
|
Ian Pace
|
|
« Reply #147 on: 17:37:09, 29-08-2008 » |
|
I would imagine there are many architects or film directors, who are equally passionate about what they do. And many more who would like to have the opportunity to do that than do. But that in no sense makes questions of subsidy breathtakingly unimportant; on the contrary, as there will never be the money available for anyone who loves their artistic discipline to be able to practise it (especially not in the most expensive ones like those mentioned above), decisions have to be made somehow as to who gets such an opportunity and who doesn't. And it's thus all the more important that these are made, or at least attempted to be made, in some type of equitable and just manner. I love what I do as well, all sides of it (playing, teaching, researching, writing), but I'm sure there are other people who love such things equally much who have not had the same opportunities to practice them.
As for the smaller ensembles, on the whole these tend to be composer-led, and often have a very high turn-over of players. I'd be hard pressed, on the basis of experience, to believe that more than a few of these players do it primarily out of love, though there are certainly a few who do. But a different possible explanation for the existence of these groups is simply the fact of there being a significant number of composers who want some way to have their own work played, preferably in a context of their own choosing.
|
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
'These acts of keeping politics out of music, however, do not prevent musicology from being a political act . . .they assure that every apolitical act assumes a greater political immediacy' - Philip Bohlman, 'Musicology as a Political Act'
|
|
|
|
Turfan Fragment
|
|
« Reply #148 on: 17:43:59, 29-08-2008 » |
|
Richard, that's nice, really it is, and I'm completely with you on that level. Passionate involvement is and should be what keeps us going as musicians. Unfortunately, it doesn't get us any further when arguing about public subsidy. Just as anyone can pretend to be 'critical' in order to tick the right boxes, it's even more common for someone to pretend they love what they just created if that's what it takes to convince the right people. You're the one who began imputing bureaucratic methods for determining levels of criticality. I certainly agree that that would be 'rigidity of thought' (not on your part, but on the part of your imagined critique police). There are no easy solutions, let alone permanent standards. The notion of 'critical composition' has to change constantly, and I am as aware as anyone that the phrase is sometimes pasted on musical events that have very little merit at all. I can think of exactly two NA Huber students who refrain from using the term to describe what they do -- and I know quite many of them. It is not a recipe, and it is not a stone tablet. Nor is it a bandwagon. I like Ian's negative definition, actually. And Spahlinger likes to say "There is no truth, there is only the specific negation of a specific un-truth of one's time." -- and he gets that from Bruno Liebrucks. Somehow I feel like I've already played this record... in any case, I would never accept that a piece of music is 'critical composition' just because any one person declares it to be so. |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
|
|
|
Ian_Lawson
Posts: 59
|
|
« Reply #149 on: 17:56:29, 29-08-2008 » |
|
Does the presence of Hello magazine make Ham Radio magazine unsustainable?
No, but it does establish a set of 'norms' outside which anything else is considered (if it be considered at all) as weird or eccentric, and therefore ghettoised. The very term 'elitism' might be viewed as such a ghettoisation. I would argue that eventually, yes, Hello will make Ham Radio unsustainable - or will do its best to do so. Take an analogy in the coffee industry. I will not go to Starbucks for three reasons: (1) I think their coffee is disgusting (2) Their aggressive expansion policy has done away with much hope for local independent cafes to thrive. If a local cafe is very clever and entrepreneurial, maybe they'll find a way - but this isn't the skill or talent that matters to me in a cafe. I want my local cafe to be passionate and uncompromising about coffee, not about business and entrepreneurship - and Starbucks has made that impossible. (3) Their enormous size means they have the financial clout to create a vertical monopoly, promising to buy out coffee-growers' entire stock but at knock-down prices, meaning growers and their workers end up paid below-subsistence wages and competitors who aren't of anything approaching a similar size can't get a look-in. I don't want to live in a world where the most important talents and skills in every field are entrepreneurship, salemanship and business enterprise. I want musicians, artists, doctors and scientists to be first and foremost musicians, artists, doctors and scientists - NOT salesmen, businessmen and consultants. (Those are not exclusive lists by the way). I want to be able to value what people do, not how they present or sell what they do. Public subsidy is (was) one way, admittedly not a perfect one, of trying to ensure that this is more likely. ************* Just saw your post, Ian - after all my wittering I'm actually about to go out soon so I don't have time to reply properly right now, but this caught my eye: Thinking of the audience and appeasing them aren't the same things, I feel. I absolutely agree with you. Who said that you shouldn't give the people what they want, you should give them what they didn't yet know they wanted? Unfortunately I don't think that's how most of our current arts budget-slashing politicians see things though. I think they do think that appeasing and pandering to the public is the same thing as thinking of them. (1) I would say it is poor quality and poor value but not disgusting (2) In my town (population 25,000) there are ten coffee shops not including pubs etc. One of them is a Starbucks. None have closed down since Starbucks opened two years ago, indeed two more have opened since. Starbucks only seems noticeably busy in the hour or so after school. (3) really don’t know much about this. Do all the thousands of independents, Waitrose and all have to buy their stock from Starbucks? I don’t have any problem valuing people for what they do. I don’t think I’m doing anything special so I can’t understand why you are unable to do this. And nor do I see why the choice to do this has anything to do with subsidy, apart from the observation that subsidised arts institutions are probably the only ones that can afford to hire your dreaded salesmen and consultants. I suspect a lot of independent artists, musicians and composers might feel that the real equivalent to the Starbucks phenomena in the world of new music is the subsidised BBC. In any case, to say that you don’t go into Starbucks, (analogous to not buying Hello magazine) is hardly a compelling argument to support your belief that Hello will eventually force the demise of Ham Radio Magazine. |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
|
|
|
|
