I'm joining in the debate started by Norman Lebrecht in the Evening Standard and on La Scena Musicale. He is discussing the growth in classical music blogs over recent months. He feels that bloggers are made up of 'pros', generally newspaper critics, 'ams', buffs, fans and wannabes, and the general mood is rather critical. Jessica Duchen does get a good and well deserved mention and you can read the whole account by visiting her site. However others don't fare so well.
My point is related to the 3rd group Lebrecht mentions, bloggers that are musicians and insiders, '..the last thing they do before bedtime, instead of a diary.'
I feel the tone is rather disparaging. Yes, for those in the industry there is a certain amount of blogging for self promotion and publicity but that is not the whole story. No matter how famous you are, and in what field that is in, you have to constantly remind the public of your presence to continue working in your chosen field. It is essential to use all available tools to allow the public access to information and material so they can choose how to spend their ever decreasing relaxation time. We are now competing with numerous t.v. channels, radio shows etc. which wasn't a problem that Mozart had.
The use of blogs also opens up a whole new world to groups of people that may not have found 'classical' music previously.
We recently posted a video on You Tube which has had comments like, 'awesome', and 'thank you so much for posting this.' These two men happen to be in the US and the chances are they wouldn't have had the opportunity to see this video without us using the technology. Maybe we can help generate a new generation of concert goers in the process.
So I shall continue my work, and in the case of this blog, it is not done by a musician himself, more by proxy..
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