# American vs European Orchestras/Cultural Impact



## HenkeTrumpet (2 mo ago)

I am doing an Ethnomusicology report based on how classical music is interacted with in the United States vs. Europe. 

I am mainly looking for Europeans take on the culture of classical music from where they are from, as well as maybe even traditions in the orchestra (instruments, procedure, audience, etc) that are specific to their region. 

What does everyone think about how classical music impacts the United States vs. what classical music means to Europe? Any answer is appreciated. 

Thanks!

- JH


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## Animal the Drummer (Nov 14, 2015)

Hello there JH and good luck with your report. I'll offer a few remarks to try and start you off.

On a preliminary matter, "Europe" (however one defines the term) is far from monolithic in this or any other respect. Certainly in my experience, which is a wide one on both sides of the pond (I'm a Brit who studied and worked over in Europe for years earlier in life and later developed a range of close contacts in the States which is, alongside France and Malta, the country I've visited most often) the different nation-states of Europe differ much more fundamentally from one another in culture and outlook than the States of the USA, and that needs to be kept in mind as a backdrop to this whole question.

Classical music fans like the members of this site will spend a lot of their time playing and listening to music and attending concerts wherever they're from. To answer the kind of questions you're asking, I'd say one needs to look beyond the specific classical music public to what, if any, impact such music has on the wider population, and there I've tended to find there's a difference depending on the size of the city or town in which folks live. 

In the big cities people everywhere - whether in the US, in the UK or in Europe - are aware of, and quite often proud of, their local orchestras even if they're not classical fans themselves. My experience in smaller cities and towns may well surprise you however, because at that level I've often (not always) found a greater degree of respect for and acceptance of classical music from non-participants in the States than I have in the UK or in Europe. In the States people seem to place a higher value on it even if they don't themselves take part in that world, whereas in the UK and Europe I've found we/they can sometimes get a just a little _blasé_ about it all. This doesn't seem to square with many people's assumptions (including those of Americans I know) but it's definitely what I've found over the years.

I hope this is of some use to you.


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## FrankE (Jan 13, 2021)

I'm nowhere near that London which is where the vast majority of the prominent orchestras are based, so I can't speak for the UK. Mainland Europe, Germany in particular has much better distribution of top class orchestras, venues, opera houses etc.
I've never been to the United States of America (would love to visit FL or TX) so I can't compare. 
When record shops were a thing I didn't see that many recordings from US orchestras NYPO, BSO, CSO, Philadelphia Cleveland or the others. Plenty from the BPO and WPO.
Even though Bernstein, for instance was a prolificly-recorded conductor, I can't recall seeing recordings of his in the shops.
In the USA were there more recordings of USA orchestras than European ones in the shops?


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## haziz (Sep 15, 2017)

FrankE said:


> .............................
> When record shops were a thing I didn't see that many recordings from US orchestras NYPO, BSO, CSO, Philadelphia Cleveland or the others. Plenty from the BPO and WPO.
> Even though Bernstein, for instance was a prolificly-recorded conductor, I can't recall seeing recordings of his in the shops.
> In the USA were there more recordings of USA orchestras than European ones in the shops?



When Tower Records was a thing, there was a good selection of recordings by both European and US orchestras in my local branches in the USA, probably with the European orchestras predominating. There were more releases by 'European' record companies such as DG, Decca and Philips, with a smaller selection from 'US' record companies such as Sony (if you can consider Sony a US record company) and RCA, but both were available.

Of course Tower Records was an anomaly in having a substantial classical music section even in their relatively smaller branches; their large branch next to Lincoln Center in NYC (home of the NY Philharmonic) was a sight to behold with it's massive Classical and Jazz sections including rare to find 'imports'. Most record stores from that era had a miserably small selection of classical recordings if any at all. Sadly Tower Records, like a lot of brick and mortar stores particularly record stores, has gone bankrupt a long time ago.


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## superhorn (Mar 23, 2010)

FrankE said:


> I'm nowhere near that London which is where the vast majority of the prominent orchestras are based, so I can't speak for the UK. Mainland Europe, Germany in particular has much better distribution of top class orchestras, venues, opera houses etc.
> I've never been to the United States of America (would love to visit FL or TX) so I can't compare.
> When record shops were a thing I didn't see that many recordings from US orchestras NYPO, BSO, CSO, Philadelphia Cleveland or the others. Plenty from the BPO and WPO.
> Even though Bernstein, for instance was a prolificly-recorded conductor, I can't recall seeing recordings of his in the shops.
> In the USA were there more recordings of USA orchestras than European ones in the shops?


. In the US , recording symphony orchestras is far more expensive than in Europe , although I'm not sure why this is the case . So studio recordings by major US orchestras in New York ,Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Detroit, Houston, Dallas, Baltimore, Washington D.C. and other cities have been a thing of the past for many years . These top US orchestras once had contracts with Decca, Sony Classical, RCA , DG and other major record labels, but this to is a thing of the past . Some, such as Boston, Chicago and a few others have been releasing live recordings on their own. house record labels .
Record stores have pretty much gone the way of the dinosaur , but on the internet you have a selection of. repertoire and performers which is far larger than any record store could house . So not all is doom and gloom for the classical recordings industry .


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

The LP took shape after World War II replacing the 78 as the principal delivery mechanism for music at home. While some big name orchestras had contracts with Mercury, Decca, Angel and other big labels in the early years of the LP pickup bands in Vienna and elsewhere were often used on recordings by companies like Vox, the Naxos of its day. It wasn't until the 1960s and 1970s when big city orchestras became a norm for recording companies. It wasn't coincidental this was the greatest era for LP and stereo sales.

This continued through the tape revolution and into the CD era. It wasn't until music began to be downloaded and later streamed that we saw the end of physical products dominating at home listening of classical music. Now YouTube makes more of it available free than most big companies had in their inventories in 1975. This is why classical recordings are more and more becoming a proprietary product sold by the originator.

As to, "What does everyone think about how classical music impacts the United States vs. what classical music means to Europe?" I live in USA and can attest the influence of classical music has shrunk dramatically in popular culture -- and even high culture -- every decade since the 1950s. Early television was full of classical music and a cereal company once popularized Tchaikovsky's 1812 overture using it as its theme music. When I grew up in the 1960s Holst's Jupiter music from The Planets was the theme music for my local TV station's 11 p.m. news program. On another channel at 11:30 p.m. I could watch a half-four program about classical music. On the radio Carl Haas's Adventures In Good Music was a staple.

In this century even the classical music programs that once appeared on cable and early dish, such as the Ovation channel, are gone. The A&E channel once programmed classical music regularly. No more. Outside of its appearance on public television and streams such as the Lloyd Rigler Foundation ARTS channel classical music has functionally died in popular culture in USA. In part because of the withdrawal of public and corporate investment the fate of orchestras in Detroit, Minneapolis and Philadelphia were all once in doubt; now all function with smaller schedules than last century, players earning far less in inflation-adjusted dollars, and scores of summer music festival gone. Most commercial classical music stations have disappeared from radio and even Public Broadcasting has withdrawn the number of stations it once had. I don't think Sirius XM has made much of a difference.

Classical music in USA is still produced by local, regional and world-class orchestras and universities and conservatories crank out new players by the thousands. Still the art form has almost no footprint in popular culture. This wasn't the case 60 years ago and its withdrawal is like a bell graph with the pinnacle beginning around the Beethoven centennary in 1970 and lasting into the CD era. In the past 30 years the retraction has been great and it no longer occupies much space in the public consciousness. Ironically there are more players playing higher quality than ever before and the one area of sure growth has been in local pay-to-play orchestras made up of retirees, students and some of the players from regional orchestras.


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## PeterKC (Dec 30, 2016)

haziz said:


> When Tower Records was a thing, there was a good selection of recordings by both European and US orchestras in my local branches in the USA, probably with the European orchestras predominating. There were more releases by 'European' record companies such as DG, Decca and Philips, with a smaller selection from 'US' record companies such as Sony (if you can consider Sony a US record company) and RCA, but both were available.
> 
> Of course Tower Records was an anomaly in having a substantial classical music section even in their relatively smaller branches; their large branch next to Lincoln Center in NYC (home of the NY Philharmonic) was a sight to behold with it's massive Classical and Jazz sections including rare to find 'imports'. Most record stores from that era had a miserably small selection of classical recordings if any at all. Sadly Tower Records, like a lot of brick and mortar stores particularly record stores, has gone bankrupt a long time ago.


I worked at a Discount Records store when I was in college in Nebraska. We had a very large section for classical music. Even in my hometown, (30,000), we had at least two stores with a wide range of classical lps. There were many recordings of US orchestras and performers. I do suspect most American labels probably were not exported. We had Boston, Chicago and San Francisco on RCA, Philadelphia, Cleveland, NYPO On Columbia, Pittsburgh on Command Classics, Minnesota, Detroit, and Eastman Rochester on Mercury. In addition, many smaller labels later emerged to record other American orchestras. Telarc/Atlanta
Delos/Seattle, Portland, Albany/Nasville/Indianapolis/Albany. Other labels worth mentioning Louisville, and CRI. Both labels pioneering recordings of modern American and European composers.


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