Nothing is a Matter of Course Reports on the life and mission of orchestras and other institutions of classical music in our time make for vexed, sometimes dispiriting, reading. If you attend to them, as I have of late, you are likely to come across ledes like the following: Orchestras Feeding America is a project [...]
Why does today’s western art music strive so conspicuously for cultural relevance? Why are many of our university music faculties more concerned with cultural theory than with applied music? Why have we lost confidence in historical and applied models of musicology, and moreover in the tonal tradition that forms the basis of the greatest musical heritage [...]
As we approach Christmas and as The Imaginative Conservative continues to perform the excellent service of suggesting gifts for the grand holiday, I had the chance to talk to one of the most successful and imaginative conservatives in the country, Kevin McCormick. A professional musician, classical guitarist, award-winning poet and composer, father of four daughters, [...]
Historian Michael O’Brien has called the South’s music Southern culture’s “major contribution” to the world.* The South has offered the world Jazz, Blues, Gospel, Bluegrass, and Rock and Roll. Without the South we would lack the music of Elvis, Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, Mahalia Jackson, Hank Williams, Bill Monroe, Robert Johnson, and Bessie Smith. Southern, [...]
On July 19, 1988, Bruce Springsteen played a concert in East Berlin, telling the crowd: “I came to play rock ‘n’ roll for you East Berliners in the hope that one day all the barriers will be torn down.” The program included Bob Dylan’s “Chimes of Freedom.” An East German concertgoer recalled: “What I got [...]
Viggo Mortensen as Franky In Sophocles’ great play, Antigone, the eponymous heroine defies Creon, the ruler of Thebes, by burying her brother, Polyneices, who fought against Creon in the city’s recent civil war. Creon has decreed that Polyneices’ treachery will be avenged by allowing his exposed body to be desecrated, “chewed up by birds and [...]
Unborn Child is the title of an album boldly released in 1974 by the rock duo Seals and Crofts at the height of their popularity. Ever hear of it? Didn’t think so. Even if you were a pop music fan during the 1970’s you likely have no recollection of the album, or its title song, [...]
“I am that gadfly which God has attached to the state, and all day long and in all places am always fastening upon you, arousing and persuading and reproaching you.” —Socrates, quoted by Plato, Apology “My work has always been about judging the distance between American reality and the American dream. There is a real patriotism underneath [...]
The purpose of cultural traditionalists ought to be to orchestrate a new renaissance for live classical music, to ensure that the dawn breaks on symphony halls that rise like polished temples in our midst rather than like ruins on abandoned hilltops. Sed me Parnasi deserta per ardua dulcis raptat amor. 1 —Virgil Perhaps our modern [...]
Is happiness rooted in pleasure, as many pop songs assert? Or does happiness stem from wealth, honor, wisdom, or political power? Aristotle contends that true happiness depends on a certain kind of understanding of the mind and soul to correctly apprehend what is true. The song “Happy” by Pharrell Williams has gone viral, topping the [...]
It has been said that the Germanic soul and the forest are one in the same thing— the mythological Forest that contrasts the splendid isolation of man in his solitude against the infinity of nature. Deep roots are untouched by frost. —J.R.R Tolkien It has been said that the Germanic soul and the forest are [...]
Born in the U.S.A., which turns 30 this week, is Bruce Springsteen’s best-selling album to date, and that should come as no surprise. Its songs—“I’m On Fire,” “Glory Days,” “Darlington County” and others—are FM radio staples, their foursquare drum, piano, base and guitar parts perfectly at home in either a Jersey Shore bar or an [...]
I believe video games are art. I don’t think that’s a very controversial thing to say anymore, but it bears repeating. It’s true that Lord of the Flies comes to mind now and again if I play a cooperative game with my friends. It’s also true that video games can be dangerously addictive. But in moderation, [...]
We tend to look back at great talent and forget the ambition and business acumen that let artistry shine through the ages. Nobody should ignore George Frideric Handel’s (1685-1759) eye for the main chance. The young German kapelmeister was already on leave-of-absence in England when his boss Prince George, the Elector of Hanover, became King George [...]