Lisa Hirsch over at The Iron Tongue Of Midnight posted an intriguing article on 7/4/2008 which examines a curious piece by music critic Martin Bernheimer which appeared in the 7/5/2008 edition of the Financial Times. In his article, Bernheimer blames the decline of regularly employed traditional music critics on the proliferation of bloggers. I call Bernheimer’s article curious because this discussion has been chewed over so many times, there’s simply no more flavor so it is a mystery why he decided to engage these issues, especially after the positive outlook on blogging at several of June’s NPAC sessions. Furthermore, Bernheimer is a well respected and established journalist and to read some of the unsupported accusations against bloggers makes him appear like the stereotypical cranky old man standing on his front lawn yelling at the kids to stay off his lawn. Fortunately, out of the dozens of professional music critics I know and respect, I can count on one hand, including Bernheimer, the numbers who share his views. Folks old and new to the blogosphere have come to realize the common knowledge that culture blogging doesn’t hurt traditional music criticism, it enhances it…
Changes Afoot
Throughout the month of July, Adaptistration and its companion blogs will be moving to a new blogging platform. It hasn’t even been a full year since moving to an independent server and we already require more space, better control, and enhanced tools. If growth is any measure of success then all of the blogs and columns at InsideTheArts.com have much to be pleased about. Along with the platform change will be …
Do Preview Clips Sell Tickets?
I had a fascinating conversation yesterday with someone in the business about whether or not preview audio clips have any impact on selling concert tickets. Conventional wisdom would dictate that giving people a sample of something before they buy is usually a good thing and clips via an orchestra’s website has any measurable impact on ticket sales one way or another.
Powerful New Development Tools
The 6/28/2008 edition of HuffingtonPost.com featured an article by Julia Moulden which focused on BringLight.com, an online service that makes it easy for donors to contribute to 501(c)3 charitable organizations. I’ve been meaning to write a series of articles about Bring Light for half a year now and there simply isn’t a good excuse as to why that series isn’t done. Regardless, publishing something the wake of Julia’s excellent article will …
A Must Read
If you haven’t read John Fleming’s article in the 6/29/2008 edition of the St. Petersburg Times that chronicles the story of violinist Stewart Kitts then you’re missing out. At a time when newspapers appear to be shedding salaried music critics and cultural reporters, it is heartening to see a paper reaffirm the value of such professionals by devoting the necessary amount of space to properly tell a story such as this. …