Shubertmaniac, there is another dynamic at work here which you're not giving credit to. In the 20th century, for the first time ever, music become recordable. This probably CREATED 'classical music'. That is, in previous times, people concerned themselves almost entirely with the music of their own day, and there was a demand for new composition. Remember that Bach was already considered archaic by the time his sons were writing, and although later composers acknowledged the intellectual contributions of their forebears, the music actually heard was mainly that of the present, not the past.
Since recording began, we have certainly been more backwards-looking than forwards-looking. One reason, for the slowdown of interest in classical music is that it has, I think, (gulp) become a little boring. How many times can you worry about rerecording and reinterpreting the same work instead of getting on with something new.
To an extent, this is the collective fault of recordability, which inhibits new artists and new music from exposure, which as you say, has a money-basis. Look at the RIAA, which is backed into a corner at present trying to uphold what has developed for the past 60 years.
What is now going on is a backlash against the bind we've been in, and music seems about to break out again in different forms. The internet, downloadability of the works of small groups without recording contracts, the reemergence of live performance over recording - these may all change the nature of music again, and with it, allow a new cycle of high art music.
Music is never stagnant and high culture doesn't disappear - it just keeps changing forms.
Since recording began, we have certainly been more backwards-looking than forwards-looking. One reason, for the slowdown of interest in classical music is that it has, I think, (gulp) become a little boring. How many times can you worry about rerecording and reinterpreting the same work instead of getting on with something new.
To an extent, this is the collective fault of recordability, which inhibits new artists and new music from exposure, which as you say, has a money-basis. Look at the RIAA, which is backed into a corner at present trying to uphold what has developed for the past 60 years.
What is now going on is a backlash against the bind we've been in, and music seems about to break out again in different forms. The internet, downloadability of the works of small groups without recording contracts, the reemergence of live performance over recording - these may all change the nature of music again, and with it, allow a new cycle of high art music.
Music is never stagnant and high culture doesn't disappear - it just keeps changing forms.