John: Point taken – I’ll try to focus this entry on more or less one idea. The other day I was a guest on a CBC radio show as part of a panel talking about “applause inflation.” Of course it does seem that all anyone has to do anymore is walk on stage and get off without tripping over themselves to earn a standing O.
\nSome people are upset that audiences give it up too easily, that their standards have slipped, that what used to be reserved for special occasions is now demeaned by over-use. Now, I have to confess I’m one of the stubborn sitters and don’t get to my feet very often, but I do feel sometimes that I have to bend to the group breeze and rise.
\nI do think that the fashion for standing after a performance has come to mean just that, a fashion that shows general appreciation. Can’t we all just get along? But I wonder if this is some evidence that the way people relate to live performances has changed in recent years. The auto-stand isn’t just happening in out-of-the-way places; you see it at Carnegie Hall, too.
\nI don’t often hear many engaged conversations about a performance as people are leaving the hall (or intermission or afterward). And if you try to strike up a conversation with the average audience member (whoever that is), you tend to get generalized, safe impressions. It often seems oddly detached, safe.
\nIt seems like more people are reluctant to express passionate specific opinions about the traditional performing arts. Yet, ask them about movies or pop music they listen to, and suddenly everyone’s a critic; they become animated talking about why they “loved” this or “hated” that.
\nI think that it’s because people consume music and movies in easy-to-get quantity. They have personal relationships with movies and TV and music because they can access it almost anytime, anywhere. And they feel secure in their ability to judge what is good and what is bad because of those relationships and they aren’t afraid to express it.
\nPeople used to have this kind of passionate relationship with live performance, but I wonder if most (and even a lot of critics) are not confident enough anymore to stake out strong opinions. What does this mean? Is it easier to have a relationship with your MP3 player? Are people too intimidated to presume a strong reaction? It’s certainly more predictable (safe) when you have control over it.
\nThis growing public detachment about traditional art is a problem. I think younger people who are growing up with this amazing access to entertainment have different expectations about the artists they choose to engage with. It’s a more interactive dynamic than the traditional I perform\/you listen mode. Newspapers are grappling with this problem. Disney’s grappling with it. Anyone who makes anything has to rethink how they’re going to interact with people. I think many traditional “content producers” are clueless about this new dynamic. Critics too, for that matter (present company excepted, of course).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
John: Point taken – I’ll try to focus this entry on more or less one idea. The other day I was a guest on a CBC radio show as part of a panel talking about “applause inflation.” Of course it does seem that all anyone has to do anymore is walk on stage and get […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-19","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-main","7":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4ePZm-j","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":18,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2006\/12\/john_standing_ovations.html","url_meta":{"origin":19,"position":0},"title":"John: standing ovations","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"December 14, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"By John Rockwell Doug: The issue of audience sophistication and naivety is bound up with the democratization of the arts. The ideal, for those who believe the arts have been dumbed down by yahoo audiences (meaning rubes, not subscribers to that estimable e-mail etc. site), is of a Leo Straussian\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "main"","block_context":{"text":"main","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/category\/main"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":23,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2006\/12\/doug_standing_for_the_cedars.html","url_meta":{"origin":19,"position":1},"title":"Doug: Standing For The Cedars","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"December 15, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"John: I had a response all but set to publish tonight when suddenly there was a huge crash and a 60-foot cedar from our neighbor's yard toppled down and smashed the back of our house. Unfortunately there's still about a third of this huge tree standing over our house, there's\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "main"","block_context":{"text":"main","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/category\/main"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":346,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2009\/03\/you_know_youre_in_trouble_when-2.html","url_meta":{"origin":19,"position":2},"title":"You Know You're In Trouble When You're Just A Can Of Peas","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"March 29, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Interactivity has been redefined in the past few years. Newspapers used to think they were interactive because they ran letters to the editor. Rarely did they respond to the letters (unless those letters demanded a correction), but \"hearing from the readers\" became a mantra for the focus-group-driven news organization.Arts organizations\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"social-media-people.jpg","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/social-media-people.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":764,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2016\/02\/five-artsjournal-stories-you-shouldnt-miss-this-week.html","url_meta":{"origin":19,"position":3},"title":"Five ArtsJournal Stories You Shouldn’t Miss This Week","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"February 7, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"Ah, an old-fashioned press-banning. Feels like the good old days. Of the 162 stories we collected this week,\u00a0a few memes emerged: It was the week of artistic directors in dance.\u00a0First,\u00a0Benjamin Millepied said\u00a0he would be leaving Paris Opera Ballet after a rather short tenure. Why?\u00a0\u201cI want to regain my freedom and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Weekly AJ Top Stories"","block_context":{"text":"Weekly AJ Top Stories","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/category\/weekly-aj-top-stories"},"img":{"alt_text":"starvingartist","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/starvingartist-150x150.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":40,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2006\/12\/john_post-tree.html","url_meta":{"origin":19,"position":4},"title":"John: Post-tree","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"December 15, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Doug: I hope you got some sleep and are dug out, as it were. As for audiences: I agree, sheep-like behavior masking a lack of conviction is bad however it's manifested, and if today it's manifested as automatic standing ovations, we're agin 'em. As for my hippie roots: I was\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "main"","block_context":{"text":"main","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/category\/main"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1252,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2016\/12\/this-weeks-top-artsjournal-reads-an-artist-identity-crisis.html","url_meta":{"origin":19,"position":5},"title":"This Week’s Top ArtsJournal Reads: An Artist Identity Crisis?","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"December 4, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"This Week: The next wave of arts journalism layoffs begins... Lots of debate about the role of artists in the Trump era... Prominent Canadian artists petition the government to \"fix\" support for creativity... It's getting harder to define what \"home\" is... Is \"mindfulness\" overrated? 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