Apr
11
A cultural commentary?
Filed Under Random Thoughts
Sunday’s Washington Post ran a story about Joshua Bell, a world-famous classical violinist, who spent about an hour playing in a metro station in Washington D.C.1 Actually, the story was about the people who walked by — most of them ignoring the violinist.
I suppose that musicians in subways are a dime a dozen, but it seems sad that almost no one, even in a city that wants to be elite, actually recognized the music or Bell’s skill. He was playing famous stuff, and apparently he was doing it very well. It’s sad that no one seemed to notice.
The article is worth your reading. Classical music seems increasingly esoteric. As Allan Bloom has observed, taste in classical music has become academic, like a preference for some obscure architectural style. Have we lost so much cultural background that classical music appeals to less than one percent of the population?2
- If you want to actually hear his performance, the Washington Post has that online as well. Click here. back↩
- See the article for the source of the one percent figure back↩
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[...] HT: Andrew Garland @ Points of View [...]