A blog to read

I want to recommend the newest ArtsJournal blog, “Life’s a Pitch,” written by my friend Amanda Ameer. Amanda’s day job is her marketing and publicity company, First Chair Promotion, and the subject of the blog is marketing for the arts, which she rightly thinks could be far stronger than it is. Just read her entry about Carnegie Hall, or more broadly about how classical music venues don’t create any sense that anything exciting is going on inside.

Obviously that’s something I might write myself, which is to say that Amanda and I are kindred spirits. But she’s hardly my clone. She knows a lot of things I don’t, and I’ve learned a lot from her. Note that she offers not just critiques, but constructive, practical suggestions — and she writes with a wicked sense of style.

She’s one of the people who’s going to make a big difference in classical music’s future.