Grabbing an Audience

[Einstein On The Beach]

Personally, I find it tragic that they had to give an explanation of who Joshua Bell is on ABC. American musical tradition is dying all around us, but we're too busy to pay attention.

I'm going to be honest, I didn't know who Joshua Bell was until this article came out. And I'm certainly not ignorant, so I don't see this as a sufficient reason to be upset.

This article really doesn't say anything. On one hand, I think it's kind of unfortunate that such an amazing talent wasn't given the time of day, but on the other hand I think, "What would I have done in that situation?" I'm pretty sure this was in a busy area, lots of people with agendas, things to do, places to go, I wouldn't really notice or take time to listen to some dude playing violin either. I get annoyed when classical musicians take something like this and cry that the sky is falling. We [musicians] are so delusionally ignorant sometimes.

What about any other situation NOT dealing with 17th century European "art music" (not that Bach of all people ever considered himself an artist, he was just a dude who worked in a church to support his family). What about a painter. What if Van Gogh (sorry I don't know any modern artists, so bear with me here) was sitting in Times Square, incognito, painting a new rendition of "The Starry Night"? How much attention from passerbys do you think he'd get? I'd bet it'd be just as much as Joshua Bell did. All I'm saying that again, this article isn't just a whole lot of nothing. It's kind of sad, yes, but the bottom line of it all is what were you expecting?

[geluf]

Personally, I find it tragic that they had to give an explanation of who Joshua Bell is on ABC. American musical tradition is dying all around us, but we're too busy to pay attention.

Well, I'm not so surprised. I mean, I know who he is...but I majored in music, we're supposed to know these things. :P

Is it sad? Maybe a little, yeah...but not unexpected.

[raphael18]

Personally, I find it tragic that they had to give an explanation of who Joshua Bell is on ABC. American musical tradition is dying all around us, but we're too busy to pay attention.

Yeah, I had no idea who the guy was until I read the article. It's not like they did this on a Saturday morning though, they did it on a weekday morning while people are frantically trying to go about their business. Before you complain about no one stopping, consider whether you would rather the guy stop, or you get your tax return back from the IRS a few days earlier. :)

[drewbugler]

http://wgms.weta.org/

just a sidenote...carry on my wayward sons.

[IllianaLancerContra]

The problem was they used a fiddle player. I bet if they used a drum corps folks would have stopped.

After all, this is a drum corps discussion group, not a wire-choir discussion group.

[StarContra4-85]

I think that using a drum corps would have ruined the "context" portion of the experiment- it's not very often that you see even small groups of street musicians playing for tips, let alone 135.

[SkyRyder_FMM]

This report is somewhat biased. To put things in perspectives for you non-DC residents, the metro stop where Mr. Bell was parked is a very busy stop near the convention center. A lot of folks using that station are trying to get to and from work, to and from lunch, etc. There simply is not a lot of time to hang and listen to someone play, regardless of who it is.

Traffic and commuting in DC is an absolute nightmare. There are no freeways that go through the city. None. Not One! There is one the enters the city and just sort of ends on the city streets. Commuting into the city is done on parkways, city streets, and streets with multiple stop lights all the way. Commuting by metro is fine, assuming you live near a metro station. One line in Virginia is along a highway that is HOV only during rush hour. You can't use it to get to the metro stops that are on this highway unless you car pool. If you were car pooling, you wouldn't need to be taking the metro to begin with. Some stops are located near highways that COULD take you close, if they had exit ramps going in the right direction, but since they only exit one way(the wrong way to get to the metro station), you can't use those. To get to a metro stop, you have to drive for several miles through residential neighborhoods on two lane roads filled with stop lights. The infrastructure simply is not there to facilitate a reasonable commute for all the people that live there.

As a result, commuting in DC is horrible. People just don't have time to stop and listen without taking even more timne out of their day away from home, their families, eating dinner at a reasonable hour, etc.

There are some really cool performers that frequent this particular metro stop too. There is one guy that plays "drums" on a collection of metal trays, pots and pans, plastic tubs, etc. - it's really cool and sounds good. People do catch sound bites here and there as they pass through. I've talked about it with co-workers all the time.

Edited April 12, 2007 by SkyRyder_FMM

[bluecoats88]

WOW! Our nation's capital doesn't even have a classical radio station. THAT's a tragedy!!

not sure what people are talking about, I live in the DC area and I know I have listened to classical music on the radio here. i believe the station was like 92.1 or something.

[kksop17]

This is interesting; but it doesn't really prove anything. I listen to classical music somewhat regularly and I just don't stop for people on the street regardless of who they might be.

Whoever said that images need context is absolutely correct. This is the principle behind sites like amazon.com, itunes, or whatever. In order for these sites to work you need a context fo what you are about to use (aka a starting point so you can comprehend what's going on). For instance, say you buy "DCI World Championship DVD's 2006" (hypothetically) from Amazon.com. The site obviously recognizes that you've bought this, and reccomends what other people have also bought who made the same initial purchase that you did.

This leads you down into the content, farther and farther until say you find a particular recording of a corps that you really like. However, without that initial frame of reference you never would have found the other content.

This principle is outlined in "The Long Tail" which is a book by the editor of wired magazine. It's a fairly proven psychological concept that people need a frame of reference or context to be able to truly understand waht they are witnessing.

If he hadn't of been in a busy, dirty, subway stop, and say in a park where people aren't commuting and perhaps had a sign identifying who he was far more people would have stopped because they now would ahve had context for what they were hearing. This really has nothing to do with "beauty" at all, and more to do with simple social psychology.

[bluecoats88]

This is interesting; but it doesn't really prove anything. I listen to classical music somewhat regularly and I just don't stop for people on the street regardless of who they might be.

Whoever said that images need context is absolutely correct. This is the principle behind sites like amazon.com, itunes, or whatever. In order for these sites to work you need a context fo what you are about to use (aka a starting point so you can comprehend what's going on). For instance, say you buy "DCI World Championship DVD's 2006" (hypothetically) from Amazon.com. The site obviously recognizes that you've bought this, and reccomends what other people have also bought who made the same initial purchase that you did.

This leads you down into the content, farther and farther until say you find a particular recording of a corps that you really like. However, without that initial frame of reference you never would have found the other content.

This principle is outlined in "The Long Tail" which is a book by the editor of wired magazine. It's a fairly proven psychological concept that people need a frame of reference or context to be able to truly understand waht they are witnessing.

If he hadn't of been in a busy, dirty, subway stop, and say in a park where people aren't commuting and perhaps had a sign identifying who he was far more people would have stopped because they now would ahve had context for what they were hearing. This really has nothing to do with "beauty" at all, and more to do with simple social psychology.

And that was the point of the experiment. they wanted to see if the beauty could transcend the context and cause people to take notice because it was so much above anything a normal street musician would be able to produce. Of the few people who did stop and listen this is what heppened for them. The beauty of the performer made them change their normal routine. But here in DC people are so busy and focused on what they are doing and what they have to do next that they don't have time to even notice anything around them, let alone stop and listen to something beautiful.