{"id":136,"date":"2008-11-17T16:08:47","date_gmt":"2008-11-17T16:08:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp\/?p=136"},"modified":"2008-11-17T16:08:47","modified_gmt":"2008-11-17T16:08:47","slug":"disneyfication","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/2008\/11\/disneyfication\/","title":{"rendered":"Disneyfication"},"content":{"rendered":"

I went to…brace yourselves…Mary Poppins <\/i>on Broadway<\/a> yesterday, and it took all strength I had left on a windy Sunday night to stop my 20-something sister from buying a Mary Poppins bird-head umbrella. Granted, the umbrella was pretty cute (if not slightly creepy), but, come on now. <\/p>\n

The joint was filled <\/i>with merchandise! It is, after all, a Walt Disney production, so the amount of merch was to be expected. Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious t-shirts, Mary Poppins dolls, Mary Poppins mugs, a signed poster from the cast (those sales were going toward Broadway Cares<\/a>, props for that), a Broadway Christmas ornament (also for Broadway Cares), souvenir sippy cups (a la the circus and sporting events), the obligatory snow globe…you name it, it was Poppinsed-out.<\/p>\n

Do classical musicians sell merchandise? Other than a (possibly signed) CD, what souvenirs can people bring home from their classical concert experience? Even the smallest bands manage to print posters and t shirts to sell in addition to their discs, so why wouldn’t\/shouldn’t classical folks? <\/p>\n

Now I for one don’t especially want\/need Hilary Hahn’s mug on a mug (although some people might…), but I would buy a tour poster. I wouldn’t have minded a mug or whatever from Doctor Atomic<\/i>, actually. We (and by “we” I actually mean “Josh’s team”) had beautiful posters created for Hilary’s tour with Josh Ritter<\/a> two summers ago, and I don’t see why we (and by “we” I mean “I”)  didn’t do the same for her recent tour of China with the Vancouver Symphony, or for her upcoming US tour.<\/p>\n

\"Hilary-and-Josh-poster.jpg\"<\/span>
Also, who was buying the merch at Mary Poppins<\/i> last night? Mostly parents for their kids. And who comes to a lot of classical concerts? Parents with their kids.  If I may digress for a moment, one thing I love about classical music CD signings is all the little kids waiting in line. Signings seem to attract kids, their parents, and then the older crowd. ((Gross Generalization!)), but something happens when kids stop taking music lessons. They go to college, cease attending concerts, and then come ’round to classical music when their culture\/”should” instincts kick in. Again, generally. <\/p>\n

So kids who take music lessons are coming to concerts. What can venues or individual musicians sell to support that? Custom-made violins (The Joshua Bell)? Music stands? A music book of artists’ favorite pieces to play as children? Practice advise books?<\/p>\n

Even the most basic, framed glossy headshots with pre-printed signatures would probably sell. <\/p>\n

Back to Disney: my mom reports that when we would go to Disney World as kids, she’d get us these Disney-produced “Passports”. Apparently, one had to run around collecting all the characters’ signatures, and this would keep us occupied for days (it’s the little things in life for me and Aliza, apparently). Wouldn’t it be cool for Deutsche Grammophon, or iTunes, even, to put together Passports for venues to sell (or for download, in iTunes’ case)? Kids could bring them to concerts and have the soloists sign them. Each page could have a photo of the artist and some basic info: hometown, age, favorite piece, etc.. There could be a violinist passport, a pianist passport, so on, so forth.<\/p>\n

Kids like collecting. And everyone likes souvenirs. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I went to…brace yourselves…Mary Poppins on Broadway yesterday, and it took all strength I had left on a windy Sunday night to stop my 20-something sister from buying a Mary Poppins bird-head umbrella. Granted, the umbrella was pretty cute (if not slightly creepy), but, come on now. The joint was filled with merchandise! It is, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","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":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-136","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-main","7":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}