Tales of Hoffmann

In the long-ago early 1990s, I was assistant editor of this august journal for three years. Thinking back to the news we covered, I’ve been wondering what has changed in the intervening decades, what hasn’t and, sometimes, what we could learn from it all if we dared to turn some of the old orthodoxies upside down.

When I started at CM, cuts to the state-supported arts under the free-market ideologies of Thatcher were wreaking havoc on the orchestral sector. The BBC had shut several regional orchestras in the early 1980s; a Musicians’ Union strike averted the closure of three more.

Myopic theories had circulated that London had too many orchestras for its population, which was about 6.8m, and in 1993 a heinous thing called the Hoffmann Report set out to close down two of three London self-governing orchestras (the Barbican-based LSO was safe). Fiasco ensued: the shenanigans, manipulations, horse-trading, biases and worse probably need a book to themselves, once all involved are deceased. Fortunately, the committee demurred from closing anything. Today musicians call it the Hoffnung Report.

Privatisation vultures were circling as the cuts bit. No wonder orchestras became preoccupied with seeking new audiences, bigger, younger, hipper audiences (the term ‘diversity’ hadn’t arrived yet). But how? In the 1980s, you were damned if you didn’t try, but seemingly more so when you did. In 1981 the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra made a commercial recording, Hooked on Classics: symphonic music with an added pop beat. It sold in gazillions. The Arts Council responded by slashing their grant, which has never matched its sibling orchestras’ subsidies since.

Wouldn’t this change in presentation trigger a change in the audience? Oh, the column inches we filled with arguments about orchestras’ ‘penguin suits’! But you can tweak presentation any time; minds are more difficult to shift. In the 1990s the London Chamber Orchestra presented concerts in Hammersmith with creative lighting, super-cool concertwear and clever marketing. They attracted metalheads in leather. Scandalous! Similarly, Nigel Kennedy’s punkish outfits attracted a huge audience, but horrified the aficionados. Nothing changed. Today orchestras either wear all black, which makes them look like stagehands – or, yep, ‘penguin suits’. Interestingly, the audience doesn’t seem to care, as long as what they see doesn’t distract them from what they are hearing.

Since the 1980s, most UK orchestras have built excellent skills in fundraising, community outreach, education projects, therapeutic health work and digital marketing. Yet the preoccupations now are the same: new, younger, more diverse audiences. That implies that something in these past two decades cannot have ‘worked’.

A substantial core audience exists for classical music – but the demographic is a bit older. Oh no! The wrong audience? But hang on… this prejudiced, knee-jerk response is ridiculous. We have an ageing population. Retirees are the ones with the time, money, freedom and inclination to go to concerts midweek.

Recently I was at Symphony Hall, Birmingham, at a 2pm weekday matinée that was jam-packed with enthusiastic music-lovers who happened to be retired. They met their friends, went for lunch first or drinks afterwards, and didn’t have to struggle home on dodgy late-night transport. The atmosphere was great and the CBSO played its socks off. For evening concerts too, earlier starts are catching on. Supposing we remember there is money to be made from good attendances? If people like earlier starts, we should have more of them.

Weekend afternoons have other advantages: you could bring your child. My dad took me to Sunday matinées at the Royal Festival Hall: not ‘children’s concerts’ but full-whack programmes with the Dvorák’s New World Symphony and – never forgotten – Strauss’s Don Juan, which nearly knocked 12-year-old me off my seat. You want young audiences? Let them hear ‘proper’ concerts at times when they and their families can go. And have ticket deals for the under-30s (or more – we stay young longer these days); some venues that do have witnessed a significant increase in younger people attending.

But there’s another issue that, just for a moment, needs a fresh look. For the last quarter-century, arts organisations have been persuaded that unless they produce, in audiences and on stage, an exact, visible mirror of the gender and ethnic balance within society, they have somehow failed. Orchestras have fallen over backwards trying to comply, initiating diversity committees, ‘blind’ audition procedures and more. Yet as time passes, any change in audiences’ and performers’ demographics has seemed tiny compared to the effort involved.

Why? Because this is an unreasonable expectation if it deals only with the top layer of the musical ecosystem. Music starts at birth; some say, before it. You can’t demand change in the profession while simultaneously destroying the grassroots of a country’s music education. Change won’t happen unless music is provided equitably in all primary schools as part of a national curriculum, plus free instrumental tuition and access to instruments. And that needs follow-through in secondary schools, local youth orchestras, universities. We’ll see if a change of direction by the new government proves more than skin deep.

The Arts Council has long imposed unrealistic demands in return for its cash; for instance, it used to oblige orchestras to perform a certain quantity of new music. This year I’ve witnessed full houses and ovations for three premieres in three months – but the turnaround has taken a long time. In the 1970s-80s, this wasn’t as good an idea as it sounds, because the trendily unlistenable styles sent audiences fleeing.

If there’s a lesson to learn, it’s about resilience, flexibility and deep, joined-up thinking.

When current ideologies fade – and they will, they always do – others will come along. We have to be ready. We need a strong support base and we must bolster all audiences, not only idealised ones. We can’t just keep repeating superficial platitudes.

Meanwhile, arts organisations will keep needing immense creativity to produce work that has genuine artistic integrity beyond the box-ticking. It is greatly to their credit that they so often succeed.