Will there still be classical music when global warming passes through the 3 deg C mark in the second half of this century? I definitely think so. Mozart and Beethoven taught us how to sublimate pain into beauty, and in the darkest of times, people will still fall in love with each other. I think when our lives will be leaner in terms of stuff, either by choice or by necessity, music will play a larger part in our lives, and Western classical music will be a solid part of the repertoire.
Will there still be star performers (I am thinking here piano, violin, cello soloists, singers, conductors) traveling all over the world giving 100 or more performances per year? I think the absolute top stars will be widely known through the internet (youtube, netflix). Perhaps it will not be very safe to travel due to the re-emergence of piracy and communicable diseases. Perhaps the public will reject stars with extravagant carbon footprints, and concerts with star performers will become as old fashioned as circuses and zoos. On the other hand, perhaps people will say "it is not so bad that I can no longer travel to Vienna because Vienna is coming to me." After their guest performances the artists will be on parties telling the local musicians what it is like to be in Barcelona or Shanghai these days, the sounds and smells, how safe it is to walk around and how friendly people are on the streets, the artists in the subway stations (or how you get around these days since the subways are flooded), and what it is like to work together with this or that famous soloist or conductor. It will be far less than 100 performances per year because the traveling performers will stay in town for a few days and socialize with the locals, perhaps they will take up residence for a few weeks or months and give master classes or work with the local (youth) orchestra etc. In those areas which are not in chaos with failed governments I think there will be a resurgence in local talents. (The concept of "local" has to be expanded here because climate refugees with their diverse cultural heritages will increasingly be part of the local scene.) Some people say everyone has it in themselves to be an artist. I disagree. I do think everyone needs beauty, and art will be much more important because we can no longer run away from the ugly cities to exotic tourist nature. But I don't think everyone has the talents of an artist or will want to express themselves in art instead of science or politics. Going to the top of the talent pyramid, if we play our cards right and have more income equality instead of growth and at most one child per family and better education for the masses, and if education includes the humanities, but also enables the children to be disciplined and work hard instead of relying on their carbon slaves, then we will discover how many highly talented children we really have and these children will get the education they deserve. One can see this already from the many world class artists coming from China, Korea, Japan. Another enabling factor for the Chinese classical music miracle is apparently also that their teachers were trained in the Soviet Union. Thank you for reading, and happy holidays. My christmas wish is that christmas presents between adults will be considered an old fashioned relic like zoos and circuses long before we have reached 3 degrees. Hans G Ehrbar _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
