The shelves of the main record store in Munich were overflowing with Elgar and Tippett.
As for living composers the score was Robert Simpson 1,Michael Finnissy 3,Ferneyhough 0 (surprisingly)Birtwistle 5 as against Helmut Lachenmann (3) some more familiar names over here were also absent.

this is of course a blunt way of measuring the popularity of British music in Germany but it`s a vague indicator.
Maybe OSudden and Richard Barrett have a more detailed perspective.
A German composer once told me that Brit music wasn`t `edgy` enough.

Well, there is of course diversity in the music of any moderately large country, but some common features can also be discerned in a musical culture (it's reasonably clear to me that lots of highly diverse French music sounds recognisably 'French', for example). I sort of imagine that the comment in question might imply that, to that listener, British music has a certain detachment, aloofness, eschewal of anything too extreme and of intense seriousness, emotional tepidity, and so on, all the things one might associate with that which is 'middle-of-the-road'. There are of course exceptions (though it's possible they might seem more similar to other types of British music to an outsider), but to me it's not that surprising that someone might arrive at such a conclusion, certainly when comparing British music to that from Germany. He/she made that comment, but may have had various other more detailed things to say about British music as well; we don't know that he reduced everything to that one throwaway comment.

If i look at lists of forthcoming performances of works by Britten, it always seems to me that great many of them are in Germany.

When assessing the popularity or saleability of any music it's important to decide 'in relation to what'? I'm saddened to hear that Tippett isn't highly regarded in Germany as he had a very European outlook and much sympathy with German   thought and culture, one of the few Englishmen of his time to read Goethe and Schiller .

But Tippett isn't wildly popular in Britain.   I think the second  biggest 'classical'  CD shop in Britain is the  HMV e in Manchester and they have only about ten Tippett CDs in the browser.

I have encountered disimissive attitudes about British music and musicians,particularly among French and Americans,and  I supect it has more to do with Politics than music,e.g.the strong feeling in America that everything British is small ,incompetent and trivial.

The flip side of this is that many Americans  cannot see how GW Bush is such a ludicrous little man, an almost Chplinesque buffoon, in Elnglish eyes.

written in great haste, i did in fact mean BRITTEN, and not TIPPETT (who i tend to think about more often)- i am going back to Munich so will have a check on the Tippett quota-
thanks for all of this feedback-it`s very interesting.

Oh, also Jonathan Harvey.

A "major symphonist" who managed to complete all of two symphonies. Big deal, eh? Glass would appear to have written more symphonies than Elgar had hot dinners, (not that I have bothered listening to most of them). Now Ives, there was a major symphonist, even if you forget the first two, (which you shouldn't, of course), or the Universe, (which you can't, 'cos he only sketched out the plan).

Going back a number of years,early 80s, but I remember entire rooms devoted to LP collections, hundreds upon hundreds,among middle incomes and youngers- a real love of music you rarely encounter here beyond this board, music clubs etc.  Import taxation was low and a lot of US product was pressed in Germany as I remember.
And with that came a certain generosity of spirit as far as I could discern. over 3 years or so. But the point about US viewsof British music is presumably linked to its corporate and funding structures, eg the lack of a Brit system of habitual public subscription and donation by way of stakeholding. In Germany there was generous public funding and a consensus that this was a good thing, but recent recession and Merkelism may be looking at this again. Yet the cultural habit of esteem of the creative is maybe strong enough to endure political and economic trends. I am out of touch with the situation on the ground, must head back over there sometime soon to take the waters.Enjoy your quest Jenny, and it'd be nice to more from you (and RB) about the public climate politically for ye arts.