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Greg Sandow on the future of classical music

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Community squared

January 9, 2013 by Greg Sandow

As I've been saying in my last post, and the one before, I've realized that my blog — all my work — involves a community. And that I want to move in new directions. So here's yet another way to move. I'd talked about taking my work to an institution (which perhaps I'd run), but if I keep it here, I've realized that I'd love some help. There are many reasons for that. First -- and simplest — is my workload. Just keeping the blog going (not to mention my newsletters, and other things I do) requires lots of administrative time. Formatting … [Read more...]

Renewal

January 7, 2013 by Greg Sandow

A belated happy new year to everyone! As I come back to my normal life after an intensely happy holiday. We have lots to do here. We need to continue the mavericks posts from last month. And of course I want to assess the condition of classical music, as I do every year. Starting, maybe, by citing some ways that — while the mavericks show great change, great success — our normal ways of doing things are failing. But I've realized a few things while I've been away. First, that I've accomplished a lot here, along with all of you who read … [Read more...]

A trip, and the new media trap

October 17, 2012 by Greg Sandow

I'll be at the University of Missouri this week, on Thursday and Friday, for a festival called Music and New Media at the Crossroads. Among other things, i'll be speaking on a public panel Thursday at 3 PM, about new media and the future of classical music, along with Matt Haimovitz, Tod Machover, my old friend Tim Page, and members of eighth blackbird, who, along with Matt, would count as newer friends. I'm looking forward to seeing all these people, along with the moderator, Robert Shay, dean of the U of Missouri school of music. Whom I know … [Read more...]

Writing tips

October 12, 2012 by Greg Sandow

Juilliard students these days don't seem to be interested in music criticism, or in music critics. I think that's partly because, if they're like most others their age, they may not read newspapers. And thus don't often read critics. But it's also because they don't think critics do a good job. This continues my previous post, about the course on how to talk and write about music that I'm teaching at Juilliard this fall. And about the online version of it I'm eager to teach, as soon as I get five or six people to enroll in it. I'm happy to … [Read more...]

How to talk and write about music

October 9, 2012 by Greg Sandow

That's what my Juilliard course this semester is about. And it's what the course should be called, though this year we adopted a title that's a hybrid of what the course used to be and what it is now: "Music Criticism: How to Talk About Music." Because for many years this was a course about music criticism. But then two things happened. First, fewer and fewer students seemed interested in criticism. I might guess that's because they — like so many people under 40 — don't read newspapers, and thus don't encounter music reviews. But as my … [Read more...]

Helping you

September 18, 2012 by Greg Sandow

I'm happy — thrilled — with how much people like my four keys to the future. Aka the four things we in classical music must do, if we want to build a new audience, and help classical music survive. And of course (as commenters have eagerly noted) there's lots more to say about how we do these four things. I'll be saying much of it in weeks to come. The first two points, especially, can be expanded. The first one — understand and respect the culture outside classical music. — is harder than it seems. One problem for the classical music … [Read more...]

My newsletter — plus a photo of Rafa

July 23, 2012 by Greg Sandow

(A digression from the posts I've been doing.] Last week, I sent out a summer issue of my newsletter -- and I've realized, with a shock, how little I talk about my newsletter here. [Pause while Greg communes with himself about how he might improve his way of doing business.] You can read my latest newsletter here. And if you'd like to subscribe and get it by email, here's where you do that. What's in the newsletter? A terrific photo of my little son, nine months old. (And crawling at light-speed, though that's not in the photo.) A … [Read more...]

Being creative, learning to brand

April 3, 2012 by Greg Sandow

I'll be teaching a workshop in June, at an entrepreneurship retreat for musicians. This retreat is something new, created by Connie Frigo's under her brand name Road of Creativity, Connie being a saxophonist, sax teacher at the University of Georgia, entrepreneur, and my friend. The dates are June 3 to 9, the place is the University of South Carolina's School of Music, which is the host, and has its own entrepreneurship center, the Carolina Institute for Leadership and Engagement in Music. A cosponsor is the D'Addario musical instrument … [Read more...]

Greg Sandow

Though I've been known for many years as a critic, most of my work these days involves the future of classical music -- defining classical music's problems, and finding solutions for them. Read More…

About The Blog

This started as a blog about the future of classical music, my specialty for many years. And largely the blog is still about that. But of course it gets involved with other things I do — composing music, and teaching at Juilliard (two courses, here … [Read More...]

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How to write a press release

As a footnote to my posts on classical music publicists, and how they could do better, here's a post I did in 2005 -- wow, 11 years ago! --  about how to make press releases better. My examples may seem fanciful, but on the other hand, they're almost … [Read More...]

The future of classical music

Here's a quick outline of what I think the future of classical music will be. Watch the blog for frequent updates! I Classical music is in trouble, and there are well-known reasons why. We have an aging audience, falling ticket sales, and — in part … [Read More...]

Timeline of the crisis

Here — to end my posts on the dates of the classical music crisis  — is a detailed crisis timeline. The information in it comes from many sources, including published reports, blog comments by people who saw the crisis develop in their professional … [Read More...]

Before the crisis

Yes, the classical music crisis, which some don't believe in, and others think has been going on forever. This is the third post in a series. In the first, I asked, innocently enough, how long the classical music crisis (which is so widely talked … [Read More...]

Four keys to the future

Here, as promised, are the key things we need to do, if we're going to give classical music a future. When I wrote this, I was thinking of people who present classical performances. But I think it applies to all of us — for instance, to people who … [Read More...]

Age of the audience

Conventional wisdom: the classical music audience has always been the age it is now. Here's evidence that it used to be much younger. … [Read More...]

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