"Making art for art’s sake, free of monetary concerns or deadlines, is a fantasy for many professional artists. But listening to snippets of Brahms and Schubert waft through sun-dappled trees one afternoon, a critic had the sense that at Marlboro such utopian fantasies remain a vibrant reality. "
By VIVIEN SCHWEITZER
Where Musicians Bask in the Luxury of Time
New York Times, Published: August 8, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/09/arts/music/marlboro-music-school-and-festival-in-vermont.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&ref=music
It's a "vibrant reality" because most of these people are not people who have to work for a living. They don't have to stress out about rent on a monthly basis. Of COURSE there are Cinderella stories here and there. But I'm talking the culture as a whole, it's an upper class thang.
So why should we be impressed that they take off an entire summer from money making when they were never subjected to those pressures in the first place? I'm mostly talking about the younger generation, here.
I honestly don't think this is an appropriate way to position the relevance of Marlboro. Yes, we all know it's the golden land for chamber music, a mega resume builder, (career guarantor, almost), and in a beautiful part of the country, with really nice people. If I ever got accepted, I would drop everything and go in a heartbeat, even if I had to pay my rent off credit cards.
But to say that they have unlimited time is somehow missing the bigger picture. When these folks return to NYC et al, and start hammering away on concerts that are put together in a couple rehearsals, what's the reason for the difference? Are most of these folks *really* funding the standard of living in which they partake? Are they really covering their expenses with their work? Are they being forced to work in a way that compromises their ideal artistic activity due to financial reasons? Really?
What I'm trying to say is that, most of the upper eschelon classical musicians in NYC live a middle class existence, and of the younger ones that are headed (or have 'arrived') in that circle are NOT PAYING THEIR OWN rent with their work. So whether they do this in a highly-visible way at Marlboro, or dispersed amongst east cost urban enclaves, what's the difference?
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- Welcome to Fuck Classical Music. A blog about how fucked up our scene is. I never want this site to be legitimate in our community, hence the obscenity in the name. With nothing to gain or lose politically, I hope I can address some things with great honesty, that would otherwise destroy a professional career. So we can try and fix this beautiful, fucked up machine of classical music. Ideas may center around NYC and contemporary music, but this is really just about America and music. Please lob a grenade while you are here.
I generally agree with this assessment/critique. That said, I know plenty of freelance musicians who rarely get to play big-C classical music because of how they have positioned themselves, financially, in terms of what supplies them with their income (be it New Music, indie rock, Broadway shows, etc.), and plenty other freelancers who do play Classical music, but probably have to play too much of it to do a great job at it. Certainly, it's the rare classical musician who actually gets to work a piece up to the level that they were taught to aspire in school. So ideally, this kind of festival would provide an opportunity to that end. But you're probably right that most of the people who get to attend a festival like Marlboro are not the kind of musician I'm describing as potentially benefitting from it.
ReplyDeleteThanks for an interesting blog.
- Judd
Oh damnit, someone else read my blog.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment.
Sorry, I check in here, like every two months between scraping the rosin dust out of the Juilliard dumpsters to make rosin cakes, which I also burn in the winter to stay warm.
You definitely have a point. My bone with the article is the fuzzy-lense-sunset shot of classical music.
"Making art for art’s sake, free of monetary concerns or deadlines"
This is something a lot of artists do, at home. Like, really bad artists, too. But it's valorized in the article as a sort of badge of boheme-cum-elysium bullshit, like these artists have become so talented that they've transcended monetary concerns at Marlboro. WTF??? Marlboro is *drenched* in money, the same money that these people grew up with.
Don't get me wrong - that kind of money is what keeps classical music alive in this country. I'd rather it be there, than not be there. But the Mark Twain, chewing on a straw thing....
C'mon Ms. Schweitzer! Dig deeper!
All you music journalists, DIG DEEPER FOR GOODNESS' SAKES!!!!!!!!