Less choice, please!

Less is the new more

It's always nice to have your preconceived notions challenged. While Julian Lloyd Webber writes an ultimately boring article for the online edition of the telegraph, lamenting young people being "bombarded" by Pop and Rock (oh no!) and asking for a conservation of Beethoven and friends, Peter Dobrin (music editor for the Philadelphia Inquirer) takes a totally different stance. According to him, there's not too little, but rather too much Classical Music around and this is confusing people: Free concerts in abundance, streams to your ipod, mp3s on several internet pages, online and offline radio, tutorials, etc... Also, the menu-like style of many modern subscription packages, allowing audiences to freely choose from a wide range of performances, is making life hard for listeners, according to Dobrin. Why not, he asks, let the musicians of the orchestra call some of them on the phone and go through the program if they like - providing them with hints and useful information about composers and compositions. And since doing this on a grander scale would be impossible to realise, why not design a software that could do the same, based on the users' favourites? Even though many musicians will protest, it's actually not as bizarre as it sounds at first. At least it's quite a lot more productive thinking about this than diving into Lloyd Webber's ocean of sadness.

Source: Julian Lloyd Webber in the Telegraph
Source: Peter Dobrin in the Philadelphia Inquirer