Musical Truths

But this was classical music. And there are a great many “clap here, not there” cloak-and-dagger protocols to abide by. I found myself a bit preoccupied — as I believe are many classical concert goers — by the imposing restrictions of ritual behavior on offer: all the shushing and silence and stony faced non-expression of the audience around me, presumably enraptured, certainly deferential, possibly catatonic; a thousand dead looking eyes, flickering silently in the darkness, as if a star field were about to be swallowed by a black hole. I don’t think classical music was intended to be listened to in this way. And I don’t think it honors the art form for us to maintain such a cadaverous body of rules

Richard Dare: The Awfulness of Classical Music Explained

This article is slightly infuriating. I know I’ve written about concert etiquette before, but this article shines a different (and less favorable..to me at least) perspective.

A big reason I go to classical music concerts is for all of the subtle pomp and circumstance; the concertmaster coming out and the oboe tuning the orchestra, the conductor and/or soloist coming out, the lights going down. All of that excites me before I even hear a note.

Yes, people used to clap in between movements, but I feel like, as someone who has performed concerts where people constantly clapped between movements (ahem…my recital >:|), it’s extremely distracting, and it takes away from the specialness of the music.

And I am by no means “stony faced and dead eyed”, half of the time I’m trying not to cry, or I’m smiling so much that my face hurts after a movement, or I have my eyes closed because I’m so into it (or in the case of watching Dohnanyi, I can’t stop staring at him!). I also take offense to that.

Why should classical music patrons have to change the way they act at concerts to make novices feel more welcomed? I have been to plenty of different classical concerts where in the program there are very understandable rules for concert etiquette.

Elitist statement or not, I like the way things are.