Dressed Down, Not Dumbed Down: Attracting New Audiences to Classical Music

Accompanied by the premiere recording, in this document I explore Dallas-based composer Mark Landson's composition, "Moments in Memory" Sonata for Cello and Piano, and how newer approaches to commissioning composers and production may impact the classical music industry's health. I, Wesley Skinner (cellist), commissioned and performed Moments in Memory. I analyze and outline ways this piece captures the preferences of the general audience, in order to attract new audiences to classical music performances. Mark Landson describes his "new classical" genre as using a combination of the harmonic language of our time and incorporating programmatic neo-romanticism. Landson's organization, Open Classical, spreads classical music to new audiences through accessible environments and relatable content, an approach the classical music industry has slowly begun to adopt. With declining in-person audiences of traditional classical music events and the financially detrimental shift to digitized media beginning in the year 2000, the research will show that the classical music industry has become increasingly less profitable and requires content tailored to the preferences of the general audience. Using detailed information from Digital Service Providers such as Spotify, I share in this document statistical information on what music people currently prefer due to the rise of internet-streamed content. Additionally, recent advancements in technology provide beneficial scenarios for the classical genre. These advancements include innovations in metadata and providing such innovative and more accessible venues of performance, including visual computing as virtual and augmented reality. Throughout history, classical music has constantly pushed boundaries through the maturation of compositional techniques, many of which incorporated elements of popular music at the time, as well as the expansion of concert halls to reach greater audiences. I conclude that classical crossover, in a sophisticated approach such as Landson’s “New Classical”, and modern development of the classical performance space can bring new audiences to classical music.