The Death of Classical Music: Can it Be Saved?

Everyone has heard the rumors floating around in the past few decades reporting the death of classical music or at least of its failing health. If one looks at the facts, it is easy to see why all of these speculations have been made. Music education has almost completely disappeared from public schools, record sales have significantly declined, and ticket cost of live performances has increased while attendance has decreased. On top of all of that, between the years of 1980 and 2000, classical music was almost completely absent from the main stream media, and in those twenty years, seventeen orchestras, such as the New Orleans Symphony, were forced to shut their doors. The world of pop was emerging and growing quickly. There was just no room for elitist classical music.

This decline in popularity has become the subject of countless blogs, news reports, books, and symposiums and has classical music supporters at a loss as to what went wrong and whether or not it is too late to save the industry. In fact, all of this talk about the death of classical music has become an industry in itself. People are beginning to ask themselves, has America given up on classical music? The answer to this question, based on the previous facts, seems obvious. However, this rumor of classical music’s imminent death is based on data that has been incorrectly interpreted. The actual numbers show a completely different story. While it is true that the popularity was waning in the past few decades, as of now, there is much more classical music being offered than ever before, both in concerts and recordings. And it is no coincidence that the rejuvenation came with one of the most important technological advances of the past decade: the Internet.

If one looks at the current record sales for classical music, the numbers are depressing. Compared to what the industry produced from 1950 to 1975, the numbers today are practically negligible. However, going beyond the major record labels, it is clear that classical music sales are actually booming. Since the creation of Apple’s iTunes in 2003, the sales of classical music have risen significantly. In fact, they reportedly accounted for twelve percent of the one billion tracks sold by iTunes in the first three years. In a recent interview with Alex Ross, a music critic from The New Yorker, Chris Bell, the director of worldwide product and music marketing at iTunes said, “iTunes is a safe place to try classical music. It is easy to sample and the buying is low-risk.” Perhaps this is why the sales have been so high. First time listeners and buyers are able to peruse iTunes’ vast selection from the comfort of their own home and buy songs one track at a time rather than investing their money into an entire CD, which they may end up not even enjoying.

While iTunes is a huge source for classical music and a main reason for the surge in sales, other sources are available for downloading as well. One of the largest online resources can be found at Naxos.com. Naxos Records, one of the biggest classical music recording labels was created in the eighties by Klaus Heymann. Heymann (seen to the right), who started his company at about the same time as the creation of the CD, saw an opportunity to profit off of recordings of mainstream classical repertory. In the early years, he relied on low priced ensembles that offered poor recordings. The business was not very lucrative, and he was not bringing in much money from it. He told Ross, “until about two years ago, for me this whole music business was a hobby, an expensive hobby.” He even put his entire catalogue online in 1996, allowing listeners to hear any track for free. It took many years for the Internet to advance to a point where he could make a profit off of his online database. Recently, however, Heymann created a subscription based library that offers higher quality sound recordings than do the free tracks. The library, which charges $19.95 per year, allows subscribers to have access to every recording that Naxos Records has online. The service, which now has over eleven thousand users, has added to Naxos’ eighty-two million dollar revenue.

Not only has the Internet helped to boost sales of the actual music, but it has also increased ticket sales for concerts. In the past few years, many major newspapers such as the New York Times and magazines such as Guardian Unlimited have argued against this claim, saying that “the concert hall is in crisis” and pointing out that season subscriptions for concert halls have plummeted. However, last-minute tickets sales have risen ten percent in the past decade. In fact, according to Matthew Westphal from Playbill Arts, “The [Metropolitan Opera] sold 83.9% of available tickets in 2006-07, up from 76.8% in 2005-06.” Before that, “figures had slipped every year since the 90.8% reached in 2000-01.” The most probable reason for this change in trend is that families have grown busier, and their habits have shifted. Many do not want to invest in season tickets where they have to commit to performances months in advance. Also, the Internet has led to a rise of first time concertgoers. People now have unlimited access to performance reviews, online radios, and streaming audio of classical music performances. They can hear samplings of the music before committing the money to buy the tickets. On top of that, there are scores of classical music blogs, such as chicagoclassicalmusic.org and the blog written by Jessica Duchen, a music journalist for The Independent. Each of these blogs, along with the countless others like these, get hundreds and sometimes thousands of hits a day, and they allow performers, composers, critics, conductors, or simply just classical music fans to get their voices heard, have immediate impact, and in some cases, to have some free advertising for themselves. Never could this have been done before the dawn of the Internet.

Although classical music has a history of riding the wave of popularity through new media in the past, starting with records, then cassette tapes, then CDs, there is no denying that the Internet has created for it a new awareness. No type of medium for obtaining classical music has ever been in existence that is as far reaching as the Internet. However, we cannot attribute all of the success to the Internet. In the words of Alex Ross, “classical music is, in fact, saving itself; Internet activity is merely the most immediately visible evidence of its refusal to fade away.” Nevertheless, fans of classical music will take this as a victory. This old, beautiful art form not only is not dying, but it looks like it will be here to stay.