Music Matters: The Land Without Music?

[Ein Heldenleben]

From the blurb I had expected the coronation music to be much to the fore but I had assumed it would be used to highlight the other issues that were only mentioned in passing, such as how do ordinary folk get to experience music(whether playing, performing, studying or just listening live) at that level given the steady removal of the means to do so. There were a couple of direct comments on the subject (state education's part from Kadiatu K-M, and brass bands from ?Judith Weir), but they didn't get followed up.

Thanks that explains my confusion . I had made the schoolboy error of assuming from the literally endless trails that this was to be an investigation into the state of Classical music in this country . What a fool I was and what a completely misleading trail strategy. Who on earth reads billings these days ?
My comments on the irrelevance of the Coronation to classical music in Britain today I completely stand by. I just wouldn’t have approached this important issue from that angle.

[Nick Armstrong]

Did you listen(or have you yet to catch up?)
I did, and am not sure what to make of it. Intelligent and articulate contributers, and mostly whole pieces of music, but I found myself a bit unsatisfied - that's probably just me expecting too much though. As the new schedule pickings are so thin as far as I'm concerned, a half-way sensible offering has too much riding on it.

Not yet, so far this has been a Tag ohne Musik…

[oddoneout]

Thanks that explains my confusion . I had made the schoolboy error of assuming from the literally endless trails that this was to be an investigation into the state of Classical music in this country . What a fool I was and what a completely misleading trail strategy. Who on earth reads billings these days ?
My comments on the irrelevance of the Coronation to classical music in Britain today I completely stand by. I just wouldn’t have approached this important issue from that angle.

Ass FF says this is a 6 part series, but if this first offering is an indication of what is to come, then I'm not sure how many I'll listen to.
This from the Guardian crit linked elsewhere rather sums it up.

But these statements are placed like impressionistic paint strokes, not even vaguely interrogated.

[Ein Heldenleben]

Ass FF says this is a 6 part series, but if this first offering is an indication of what is to come, then I'm not sure how many I'll listen to.
This from the Guardian crit linked elsewhere rather sums it up.

Yes I read the whole review through the link on the other thread . It was indeed impressionistic rather than analytical . You have to construct some sort of argument or thesis in current affairs or issue programmes otherwise they are just pointless. There needs to be a debate not just a collage of quotes . The problem is that those sort of producers work on Radio 4 on things like File On Four and not.Radio 3 . Though Richard M should be capable of doing it

[french frank]

Ass FF

I beg your pardon!!

[LMcD]

I beg your pardon!!

The 's' is a long way from the 'k' on my keyboard.

[oddoneout]

I beg your pardon!!

Oh dear - I am sorry. Mind you, the french Poitou ass is a lovely creature...

[jonfan]

I wonder if in his series he'll name the BBC among those public institutions letting the arts down? Or will he praise Radio 3 to the skies - for giving him a chance to air his views? We shall see.

"And, perhaps most demoralising of all, the widespread feeling that many people at the top of government, local government and public institutions are not only indifferent to classical music (that has long been the case) but actively hostile."

What’s letting the arts down is central government since 2010. BBC has suffered 30% drop in income since then, local authorities find they can barely cover the services they are legally obliged to give, never mind the arts. Next week I’m attending Opera North Orchestra’s concert in Huddersfield TH of Strauss’ Four Last Songs and Mahler 1. Kirklees and ON have put these concerts on for many years. This could be the last as the council’s effectively broke.

[Ein Heldenleben]

What’s letting the arts down is central government since 2010. BBC has suffered 30% drop in income since then, local authorities find they can barely cover the services they are legally obliged to give, never mind the arts. Next week I’m attending Opera North Orchestra’s concert in Huddersfield TH of Strauss’ Four Last Songs and Mahler 1. Kirklees and ON have put these concerts on for many years. This could be the last as the council’s effectively broke.

Exactly right . Since Cameron and Osborne’s austerity policy it’s been downhill for all public services - but less so for the NHS and Education that have been partially protected. The BBC has been completely done over - only surviving because of vastly increased revenue from commercial activity . Activity that has compromised its core editorial purposes ( in my view). And as for the courts and prisons - literally falling to pieces.
Something that this series is completely pussy footing around of course .

[Master Jacques]

Exactly right . Since Cameron and Osborne’s austerity policy it’s been downhill for all public services - but slightly less so for the NHS and Education that have been partially protected. The BBC has been completely done over - only surviving because of vastly increased revenue from commercial activity . Activity that has compromised its core editorial purposes ( in my view). And as for the courts and prisons - literally falling to pieces.
Something that this series is completely pussy footing around of course .

Pussy footing is the word. If there's to be any hope for art music in this benighted country, it needs a revolution: the smug fat cats at ACE need to be hauled bodily out of their comfy offices and thrown back onto the street where such moggies belong. They have betrayed our trust, betrayed the arts and betrayed their country, and should be treated like the criminals they are for their outrageous, self-serving behaviour - not just over the last (appalling) decade, but over the last generation.

These appalling individuals equate "the arts" with feathering their disreputable, bureaucratic nests. They distrust true artists with a vengeance. Any "funding reform" must be root and branch.

[Ein Heldenleben]

Pussy footing is the word. If there's to be any hope for art music in this benighted country, it needs a revolution: the smug fat cats at ACE need to be hauled bodily out of their comfy offices and thrown back onto the street where such moggies belong. They have betrayed our trust, betrayed the arts and betrayed their country, and should be treated like the criminals they are for their outrageous, self-serving behaviour - not just over the last (appalling) decade, but over the last generation.

These appalling individuals equate "the arts" with feathering their disreputable, bureaucratic nests. They distrust true artists with a vengeance. Any "funding reform" must be root and branch.

Steady on old chap .
The one and only time I made an arts / current affairs doc which dared to suggest that the Arts Council were less than perfect you wouldn’t believe how they bleated.

But even so it’s the political decisions above them that are the real key to this not the Henleys of this world. He is a reverberating empty vessel.

Its a fateful interaction of cuts , political correctness and right on anti - elitism. (Mmm sounds like the Beeb as well)

We are fighting a losing battle - time to move to France , Italy or Germany…

[Retune]

I listened - to be honest there’s better analysis of the problem on this forum. It was too much of a collage of opinion rather than a constructed argument. Hardly surprising as it’s a complex series of questions. I think it’s very difficult to tackle both classical music education and performance groups in one programme. There’s just too much to go at. There was far too much focus on the music at the Coronation which I think has virtually no relevance to the day to day problems in both education and the decline in subsidy for orchestras and opera. Also, unless I missed it , nothing on the BBC.

Yes, I was suspicious of the new format but this was worse than I expected. Several contributors had interesting points to make, but the producers just played a tune and went on to something else. I don't know if Classic FM does extended documentaries, but this format would suit them, yet another playlist of short works occasionally interrupted by speech. Bits of the Tom Service show (there was probably a decent half hour programme in there somewhere) seemed more like the old Music Matters, if you could be bothered to find them in a bland sea of random space filling snippets, little different to every other morning on R3 now. It was a breath of fresh air to arrive finally at RR, where they seemed to be doing all they could to cram in as much as possible into the truncated slot.

[smittims]

I too found this programme disappointing; not enough serious discussion, and Gavin Higgins' the only really pointed comments.

[Serial_Apologist]

I too found this programme disappointing; not enough serious discussion, and Gavin Higgins' the only really pointed comments.

My impression would have chimed with what some women complain about being ignored in company boardrooms.

[Master Jacques]

Steady on old chap .
The one and only time I made an arts / current affairs doc which dared to suggest that the Arts Council were less than perfect you wouldn’t believe how they bleated.

But even so it’s the political decisions above them that are the real key to this not the Henleys of this world. He is a reverberating empty vessel.

Its a fateful interaction of cuts , political correctness and right on anti - elitism. (Mmm sounds like the Beeb as well)

We are fighting a losing battle - time to move to France , Italy or Germany…

Forgive me for renewing the attack, but it is the Henleys of this world who are the core of the problem, not here-today-gone-tomorrow governments. Timeservers who kow-tow to government, trading away the independence of the Arts Council to foster their own administrative careers, while exponentially increasing the amount of red tape for "client organisations" which the Arts Council should exist to serve, not the other way round, are the worst evil here.

The Henleys also dictate what's demanded of their "clients", in the way of socio-political activity, if they are to retain their share in the diminishing pie. And that pie is, of course, increasingly consumed by the bureaucracy required to keep track of Arts Council paperwork, rather than going to fund artistic endeavour. Henley (who personally clearly leads the crusade against "classical music" and "opera" in particular) is a dangerous example of a corrosive breed which is killing the arts in our country, and our time.

I agree with you, of course - next time I want to come back as a German, please. They value the arts in the way any healthy society should, and strive to keep them independent of social engineering.