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Music journalism

Journalism genre

Music journalism

Summary

Journalism genre

Experience Music Project

Music journalism (or music criticism) is media criticism and reporting about music topics, including popular music, classical music, and traditional music. Journalists began writing about music in the eighteenth century, providing commentary on what is now regarded as classical music. In the 1960s, music journalism began more prominently covering popular music like rock and pop after the breakthrough of the Beatles. With the rise of the internet in the 2000s, music criticism developed an increasingly large online presence with music bloggers, aspiring music critics, and established critics supplementing print media online. Music journalism today includes reviews of songs, albums and live concerts, profiles of recording artists, and reporting of artist news and music events.

Origins in classical music criticism

[[Hector Berlioz]], active as a music journalist in Paris in the 1830s and 1840s

Music journalism has its roots in classical music criticism, which has traditionally comprised the study, discussion, evaluation, and interpretation of music that has been composed and notated in a score and the evaluation of the performance of classical songs and pieces, such as symphonies and concertos.

Before about the 1840s, reporting on music was either done by musical journals, such as the Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung (founded by Johann Friedrich Rochlitz in 1798) and the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik (founded by Robert Schumann in 1834), and in London journals such as The Musical Times (founded in 1844 as The Musical Times and Singing-class Circular); or else by reporters at general newspapers where music did not form part of the central objectives of the publication. An influential English 19th-century music critic, for example, was James William Davison of The Times. The composer Hector Berlioz also wrote reviews and criticisms for the Paris press of the 1830s and 1840s.

Modern art music journalism is often informed by music theory consideration of the many diverse elements of a musical piece or performance, including (as regards a musical composition) its form and style, and for performance, standards of technique and expression. These standards were expressed, for example, in journals such as Neue Zeitschrift für Musik founded by Robert Schumann, and are continued today in the columns of serious newspapers and journals such as The Musical Times.

Several factors—including growth of education, the influence of the Romantic movement generally and in music, popularization (including the 'star-status' of many performers such as Liszt and Paganini), among others—led to an increasing interest in music among non-specialist journals, and an increase in the number of critics by profession of varying degrees of competence and integrity. The 1840s could be considered a turning point, in that music critics after the 1840s generally were not also practicing musicians. However, counterexamples include Alfred Brendel, Charles Rosen, Paul Hindemith, and Ernst Krenek; all of whom were modern practitioners of the classical music tradition who also write (or wrote) on music.

Women music journalists in the twentieth century who covered classic music performance include Ruth Scott Miller of the Chicago Tribune (1920–1921), Henriette Weber at the Chicago Herald-Examiner, and Claudia Cassidy, who worked for Chicago Journal of Commerce (1924–1941), the Chicago Sun (1941–42) and the Chicago Tribune (1942–65).

Classical

In the early 1980s, a decline in the quantity of classical criticism began occurring "when classical music criticism visibly started to disappear" from the media. At that time, leading newspapers still typically employed a chief music critic, while magazines such as Time and Vanity Fair also employed classical music critics. But by the early 1990s, classical critics were dropped in many publications, in part due to "a decline of interest in classical music, especially among younger people".

Also of concern in classical music journalism was how American reviewers can write about ethnic and folk music from cultures other than their own, such as Indian ragas and traditional Japanese works. In 1990, the World Music Institute interviewed four New York Times music critics who came up with the following criteria on how to approach ethnic music:

  1. A review should relate the music to other kinds of music that readers know, to help them understand better what the program was about.
  2. "The performers [should] be treated as human beings and their music [should] be treated as human activity rather than a mystical or mysterious phenomenon."
  3. The review should show an understanding of the music's cultural backgrounds and intentions.

A key finding in a 2005 study of arts journalism in America was that the profile of the "average classical music critic is a white, 52-year old male, with a graduate degree". Demographics indicated that the group was 74% male, 92% white, and 64% had earned a graduate degree.

In 2007, The New York Times wrote that classical music criticism, which it characterized as "a high-minded endeavor that has been around at least as long as newspapers", had undergone "a series of hits in recent months" with the elimination, downgrading, or redefinition of critics' jobs at newspapers in Atlanta, Minneapolis, and elsewhere, citing New York magazine's Peter G. Davis, "one of the most respected voices of the craft, [who] said he had been forced out after 26 years". Viewing "robust analysis, commentary and reportage as vital to the health of the art form", The New York Times stated in 2007 that it continued to maintain "a staff of three full-time classical music critics and three freelancers", noting also that classical music criticism had become increasingly available on blogs, and that a number of other major newspapers "still have full-time classical music critics", including (in 2007) the Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, The Baltimore Sun, The Philadelphia Inquirer, and The Boston Globe.

References

References

  1. Bujić, Bojan (n.d.), "Criticism of Music" in ''The Oxford Companion to Music'', [[Oxford Music Online]].
  2. "Concerning Ruth Miller", ''Chicago Tribune'', November 7, 1920, p. 97; Hannah Edgar, ''Chicago on the Aisle: Claudia Cassidy's Music Criticism and Legacy'', BA Thesis, University of Chicago: 2018.
  3. Sandow, Greg, [https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB118194664260737253 "Yes, Classical-Music Criticism Is in Decline but the Last Thing the Industry Should Do Is Blame the Press"] {{Webarchive. link. (2018-01-12 , ''Wall Street Journal''. Accessed on March 9, 2010.)
  4. Schick, Robert D.. (1996). "Classical Music Criticism: With a Chapter on Reviewing Ethnic Music". Garland.
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  6. Osborne, William. (June 11, 2005). "Women Music Critics". International Alliance for Women in Music.
  7. Wakin, Daniel J., "Newspapers Trimming Classical Critics", ''The New York Times'', June 9, 2007.
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  10. Gendron, Bernard. (2002). "Between Montmartre and the Mudd Club: Popular Music and the Avant-Garde". University of Chicago Press.
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  16. Slonimsky, Nicolas. (2000). "Lexicon of Musical Invective". W. W. Norton & Company.
  17. Nekola, Anna. (2013-09-13). "'More than just a music': conservative Christian anti-rock discourse and the U.S. culture wars". Popular Music.
  18. Larson, B. (1970). ''Rock & Roll, the Devil's Diversion''. Bob Larson.
  19. Noebel, D. A. (1969). ''The Beatles: A study in drugs, sex and revolution''. Christian Crusade Publications.
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  28. Reid, Alastair. (March 22, 2013). "How To: Get Into Music Journalism". Mousetrap Media Ltd.
  29. Whiten, Jon. (May 18, 2010). "Jersey City's Tris McCall Joins the Star-Ledger". Jersey City Independent.
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  33. Fitzmaurice, Larry. (9 March 2016). "The Curious Case of The 1975, the Most Hated and Loved Band in the World".
  34. Coscarelli, Joe. (2020-09-30). "The Only Music Critic Who Matters (if You're Under 25)". The New York Times.
  35. (2024-04-23). "Taylor Swift Is Proof That How We Critique Music Is Broken". Bloomberg.com.
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