Four Misconceptions about Classical Music

“Classical” music has a bad reputation among mainstream music lovers. It’s likely that most people in your life are radio listening pop music buffs who wouldn’t give classical music 5 minutes of listening time because of their preconceived ideas. Sadly, they’re missing out on a whole genre of music that is so vast that it’s nearly impossible to not find something to like.

Do you know somebody who gives classical music a cold shoulder? They’re probably holding on to one of these misconceptions.

It was once the “In” thing!

It’s true. Throughout most of music history, what we call “classical” music was the Rihanna, The Beetles, Michael Jackson, and Adele of its day. If you and your young friends were going to a concert in the 17th century, you may have gone to see a Beethoven symphony. A night of dancing might have been to the music of a string quartet. It may not be the cool thing now but it wasn’t until the advent of Jazz in a town called New Orleans in the early 20th century that classical music started to gain the reputation it now has.

Everybody Listens to Classical Music!

Did you love The Lord of the Rings movies? How about the newest Batman movies? Starwars? Just about every chick flick? Those movies that spark so much emotion in you come largely from the soundtrack happening behind the movie and that soundtrack is often music written in the style of classical music. Did you know that there is a Lord of the Rings symphony? It’s an Amazing piece of classical music that movie buffs love. Check it out!

It’s not all Boring!

Let’s not fool ourselves. Nobody will like all styles of music. If you like Adele you may hate Lil’ Wayne but that doesn’t mean you hate all popular music. It’s just a segment of the genre that you don’t enjoy. Classical music is the same way. You might use Mozart as a way to fall asleep at night but other styles, like Copeland, Bernstein, or John Williams might find a spot in your ITunes playlists. Don’t count it all out because you didn’t like some of it. Keep looking and listening.

It’s not “Classical” music!

Classical music comes from the Classical period—the period from about 1750 to 1820. Think Mozart, Haydn, and early Beethoven. There is more than 500 years’ worth of music that isn’t “classical”. This includes music from the Romantic, Baroque, Renaissance, Impressionist, and 20th Century time periods.

Before we get snooty about it, we have to blame the music scholars. If those music scholars have such a problem with the misuse of the term, why haven’t they found a better term? The truth is, they’ve tried but nothing has caught on. “Orchestral Music” isn’t accurate because not everything in the genre involves an orchestra. They tried “serious” or “art” music but who wants to walk around saying they love “art music?” Nobody has found the perfect, marketing-savvy term to describe this style of music.

Until the perfect term is found, education is the best way to combat this perception. (It also makes you sound more cultured if you know the distinction. You can bring it up when you’re having dinner with somebody really important.)

Bottom Line

There’s a lot of music to choose from and to think that you’ll enjoy all styles is unrealistic but what is commonly called classical music is the largest genre of music on the planet. It’s all over the world and it’s highly unlikely that you or the people you know will hate all of it. Some of the best music isn’t advertised and it won’t appear on the front page of ITunes. You have to search for it but when you find it, you’ll wonder why weren’t looking for it sooner.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Classical_music

————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————–