In a recent article Norman Lebrecht (today’s Cassandra of classical music; there have been others at various times) once again took aim at the major labels, Sony in particular, to keep the pot boiling on his apocalyptic vision of the industry. I don’t care to challenge the errors of fact, selective use of statistics, and sheer ignorance of economics that pepper his arguments. They will be familiar to many readers. One of his particular targets, however, is the “crossover” title, which he claims falsely inflates the reality of classical music sales and to which he also objects on principle, I assume because it earns him the applause of the unfortunately large number of classical music snobs eager to look down on anything that does not meet their personal standard of cultural significance and ideological purity. This position is, of course, hypocritical on its face. If such things didn’t exist, Lebrecht would never have achieved the notoriety he currently enjoys. He loves them; they are his meal ticket. His position resembles that of a certain famous British Marxist historian of the ’60s and ’70s who always charged the highest fees to lecture Western students on the evils of capitalism.
But enough of Lebrecht. My point actually has nothing to do with him personally, but centers on the relentless finger pointing at “crossover” releases as a sign of our theoretically ailing times. How short the memories of record collectors are! Crossover titles have always been with us, and they’ve never been anything to worry about. In fact, one of the reasons for the selective amnesia on the part of the (for lack of a better term) “anti-crossover” movement stems from a basic fact about the very nature of the genre: it’s a short-term phenomenon. Virtually all of such projects are designed to make a fast buck, which they either do or do not, before they disappear into oblivion. Of course, not all crossover projects are created equal. Let’s look at a few different kinds.
First, there is the “old wine in new bottles” approach, with the “new” being some gimmick that presumably makes the music more “popular” or “approachable” to the unwashed masses. Remember the Cambridge Street Buskers? This charming pair of street musicians actually won a Deutsche Grammophon recording contract in the early ’80s by playing Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries” on flute and accordion. You won’t find them in the current Universal catalog. Big surprise. Moving back in time a few years to the late ’70s, there was according to EMI (for reasons no one has yet been able to determine) a purported fascination for the Japanese koto ensemble, and with it such delightful melding of Orient and Occident as “Koto Respighi” and “Koto Vivaldi.” And who can forget Zamfir, the “king of the pan flute?” These are just three examples out of dozens from the past three decades, and you know what? Classical music survived them all.
Second, there is the “dumbing down” sort of compilation. Perhaps the most famous of these was Arthur Fiedler’s 1950s Boston Pops hit “Classical Music for People Who Hate Classical Music.” More recently, we have seen such charmingly named productions as “Classical Music for Idiots,” and “The Only Classical Recording You Will Ever Need.” As much as hard-core collectors may despise such things, the indisputable fact is that such compilations can sell very well. Some listeners prefer to sample their classical music in small doses or as highlights from larger works. Not only does this strike me as a perfectly reasonable entertainment option, advocates of a more serious approach might do well to consider that one of the reasons this market for “easy listening” exists stems from the fact that many people are turned off by the arrogant superiority and intimidating obnoxiousness of certain particularly aggressive purists. And there’s always the chance that encountering these collections might lead the intrepid listener into deeper waters. It does happen from time to time.
The third sort of crossover project, the one that excites the most ridicule, involves classical artists attempting pop music, or popular artists going classical. Again, amid the folderol and brouhaha attending each new Charlotte Church or Andrea Bocelli release, I wonder where people’s memories are? Bocelli, in any case, is a trained singer with a pleasant tenor voice who really wants to sing opera. He takes the works essentially as the composer wrote them and does his best. But what about such efforts as “Classical Barbara,” the great Streisand’s “serious music” outing? Anyone remember Renata Scotto singing “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” on the Mike Douglas show? Or Bidu Sayao and “Everybody Does the Samba” on the Bell Telephone Hour? Good clean fun, that’s all it is. There’s something so repulsively patronizing when a self-styled music lover affects an attitude of being “offended” on behalf of the art of music just because Michael Bolton wants to sing some of the greatest operatic tunes ever written for the male voice, or because Billy Joel wants to record some of his piano pieces. Good for them!
The arguments against crossover productions, however they are framed, boil down to two. The first is the old “zero sum game:” resources are limited and money going into crossover CDs could be better spent on serious classical music productions. This ignores a couple of obvious economic facts, one being that there’s no reason why a large company with substantial resources cannot cater to both markets at once, and another being the fallacious assumption that money not spent on crossover productions is just sitting in a vault somewhere, available for projects more in the classical mainstream. With the current CD glut making available more titles than ever before at the lowest prices, anyone who believes that crossover releases have drained the life out of hard core classical recordings needs a reality check. Even Sony, Mr. Lebrecht’s principal culprit, has issued in just the past few months generally excellent new recordings of music by Saariaho, Salonen, a Jane Eaglen aria collection, Rachmaninov four-hand piano music, and Hilary Hahn playing violin concertos by Brahms and Stravinsky. Should they have done more in this market? I think not.
Still, the more pernicious argument leveled against crossover productions is that they are somehow “bad” for us generally; that they cheapen or demean music in a horrifyingly crass attempt to (shudder) make money for the company in question. I think we’ve dealt with the economic fallacies at the heart of this argument. What remains is a rather sad, even pathetic conception of our classical music culture–to say nothing of the works themselves — as a fragile, even sickly thing that needs careful tending and special treatment in order to thrive. Such views say more about the rampant negativity of so many self-appointed guardians of Western civilization than about any musical truth.
By its very nature, the principal quality of a “classic” is robustness. Anyone who has taken the time, however briefly, to acquire some knowledge of the actual working conditions under which the masterpieces of (say) Bach, Mozart, or Beethoven were created understands this. Comparatively speaking, we live today in an artistic paradise. The great classics have already survived the passing of the culture that gave them birth in order to earn their special status. In fact, this music is so expressive, attractive, and accessible that no matter how badly (or strangely) it’s played, how foolishly arranged or altered, it still manages to retain those qualities that make it great, recognizable, or relevant. This fact, of course, explains why the classics inspire so many crossover productions in the first place.
Without exception, the history of the music industry demonstrates beyond doubt that no classic, no work whose very essence is its durability over time has ever been damaged in any measurable way by anything that any record company has ever inflicted on it. Whether the same can be said of the impact of Mr. Lebrecht and his crowd only time will tell, but I suspect that classical music will survive even them. I have no problem at all asserting my belief in the enduring value of the music of the great composers, and will continue to anticipate with pleasure each recording as it comes, knowing full well that some will be good, and others bad. I would much rather listen to the worst crossover project than to the cynical ranting of a few doomsayers who make a living cultivating snobbish elitism on the one hand, and a faithless, narrow minded, decadent view of our musical culture on the other.
David Hurwitz
