If I go by
what Ted Gioia has been writing lately “we are winning” on the front of AI
being seen as hated and getting some potential controls
https://www.honest-broker.com/p/we-are-winning
https://www.honest-broker.com/p/we-are-winning-update
So, if we are winning in the sense that corporate suits
have said words to the effect that a bunch of us don’t want to be subjected to
music generated by the spawn of Clippy and Autocorrect that’s a small win, if
that’s really what’s going to happen.
On the other hand, Gioia has a piece asking what is
happening to music criticism and on this front “we” have been losing slowly and
steadily since the end of the Cold War.
https://www.honest-broker.com/p/what-is-happening-to-music-criticism
Many sizable
communities are in even worse shape. They don’t have a single salaried
journalist covering the culture beat.
Yeah, this has been the trajectory for the last thirty or
so years. There was a time when I’d check the classical music coverage of both The
Seattle Weekly and The Stranger. I never met Chris DeLaurenti but Gavin
Borchert and I ran into each other at a few classical music events now and then
in the last twenty years. Seattle is big
enough of a music scene that it’s possible to keep tabs on culture despite
things like covid lockdown protocols because the internet makes it possible to
stay in touch and read coverage of events.
Gioia can’t be “that” surprised in the long run. After all, even by Ted Gioia’s account (all
the way back in 2014), music criticism has been in a bad state. Consider his essay “Music
Criticism Has Degenerated Into Lifestyle Reporting”. One of Gioia’s complaints was that things had
gotten to the point where just using jargon from music theory was scorned. When music criticism has turned into
lifestyle reporting then it’s not about the music it’s about the artist (which
is not exactly the same thing).
I am sympathetic to the idea that a work of criticism can
be a valuable contribution to cultural activities. I even like the idea that, for instance, acts
of citizen journalism about the arts can be of some value to folks. What I am far, far less certain about is the
surmise that the traditional written review is “needed” because somebody at The
New Yorker has cleared his throat and made a spirited literary defense of his
own job, all in the spirit of guild cohesion, perhaps.
Of course, I am referring to Richard Brody’s recent essay
claiming that reviews (as arts criticism) are the most inherently
progressive mode of arts writing (emphasis all his).
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-lede/in-defense-of-the-traditional-review
