This experience was not, ultimately, dependent on the super-high professional standards insisted on in the elite national music world. It was something within the compass and imagination of the quite ordinary part-time musicians in the local halls and schools and churches.
These locally practising musicians were of course influenced by many things, social as well as musical, and it would not do to give either too purist or too generalized a picture of what drew each to his or her musical engagements or the views each held of these. One aspect, however, which to some degree or other set them within an overall common background was the general evaluation of the place of classical music in our culture and the model most people had of this. These shared assumptions were usually implicit only, but some brief (if simplified) comments on this model of classical music are relevant for understanding the local scene, even though to many readers they may seem too obvious and ‘natural’ to need stating.
The musical organisation, artistic forms, and personnel associated with classical music in the broad sense of that term2 were widely, if rather vaguely, assumed to be bound up with many privileged institutions and values of our society: the educational system, church and state functions, and the generally accorded status of a ‘high art’. This status was further supported by the existence of specialised musicians who had managed to establish themselves as a recognised profession with control over recruitment and evaluation. The performances and high-level teaching provided by these experts formed the most visible element in what was accepted as the classical music world. The model of classical music in English society was explicitly defined by the specialists in terms both of the kind of music played – most typically performed in a formal public concert – and its historical and theoretical basis.
There were many detailed differences within this overall world, not least the changing historical styles as analysed in advanced musical studies, but in general terms the current idea of the European classical music tradition, as distinct both from non-European music and from ‘popular’ forms, centred round transmitting the works of influential musicians from the past – the ‘great composers’. Musical genres have of course varied at different historical periods, but those commonly cultivated in local (as in national) performances included orchestral symphonies, suites and concertos, instrumental sonatas, oratorios and classical operas, and vocal music of various kinds, usually with instrumental accompaniment and with the underlying idea that their central essence could be – and was – represented in written scores. There were also classical compositions for particular instrumental combinations from recorder groups to string quartets and instrumental duets, following accepted conventions about both the instruments (specific types of strings, wind and keyboard together with the voice and to some extent percussion), and about how they should be played.
In practice what was classified as within this classical tradition depended not so much on an objective set of criteria as on cultural conventions about the appropriate forms and contexts of music – ones which those outside this world regarded as uninspiring but which classical musicians could justify both in terms of particular patternings of melody, harmony and thematic structures and by the accepted classifications by music specialists, further authorised by the strongly held image of this music as an artistic heritage coming down in written form from the past. Just what was included changed from time to time, and the whole concept of classical music was certainly fuzzy at the edges; what was clear was that it was based not just on musicological content but on definitions and validations by particular groups of people.
This socially defined canon of classical music was what present-day musicians largely worked with. A few themselves composed, but in general their central responsibility was the perpetuation of this heritage, teaching others the skills to appreciate it or to realise it in their own playing. They thus transmitted the musical works written by earlier composers and did so in a context in which this was considered a high, indeed revered, form of artistic expression supported by widely accepted values about high art and (in some cases) direct state patronage. Concerts by nationally and internationally known soloists and orchestras and by varying combinations of professional players, both live and broadcast, epitomised what most people envisaged as the classical music tradition of this country, backed up by the system of specialised music training, national music colleges and professional musicians.
These activities by elite musicians perpetuating the musical heritage of the past in public concerts made up the most visible manifestation of classical music. But they did not constitute the whole of the classical musical world as it was realised in practice. Certainly this particular model deeply influenced even those on the face of it far removed from the specialist performances of highly qualified professionals. But, as will be clear, there was also a whole grass-roots sub-structure of local classical music. Though perhaps ‘invisible’ to most scholars, in practice this was the essential local manifestation of the national music system, and also (as emerged in chapter 2) both interacted with it and formed its foundation. One aspect was the provision of audiences with the necessary skills of appreciation for professionals coming to give concerts locally, but it extended far beyond this to the whole system of local training, playing, actively practising musical groups and public performances by local musicians.
This ideal classical model was a powerful one which, however vague at the edges, implicitly moulded people’s views of music and of their own participation in it at the local level. They were taking part, it was assumed, in a high art form validated by an authorised historical tradition and a structure of professional specialisation in which experts had to undergo rigorously assessed training ultimately controlled by the highest members of the profession. Of course not everyone who went to a classical concert, learnt the piano or played the violin in a local orchestra had formulated this explicitly or expected his or her own performance to measure up to the highest level of this ideal. Nevertheless, the model had a profound influence throughout the musical groups and activities that were widely seen as part of the world of classical music.
The local awareness of links with the wider classical world and its authorised canon from the past came out in many contexts. One concrete form was the printed scores and music ‘parts’ which were a necessary channel for transmission and performance among local classical groups, both instrumental and vocal. These were often borrowed rather than bought and when a local choir, say, found itself, as so often, singing from old and well-marked copies, it was easy to picture the earlier choirs 20, 30, even 50 years ago singing from the self-same copies – and repertoire – of classical choral music in the days when, perhaps, those parts cost just one penny. Local performers could also regard themselves as the amateur counterparts of the specialist professionals, their reflection at the local level, playing however imperfectly from the same classical canon. It was this pervasive model of the lengthy and highly valued classical tradition which ultimately set the definitions of the musical activities in which local amateurs were engaged.
Amidst these many locally based classical musical activities, what kind of people were the main participants? Is the prevalent assumption justified that classical music is primarily a ‘middle-class pursuit’ or confined to the ‘elite’ rather than the ‘common people’? Judging by Milton Keynes there was certainly one sense in which this was true: if one focusses primarily on highly trained specialist musicians and the national institutions in which they participate, this is almost by definition an elite and select world; and insofar as this model influenced people’s interpretations, classical music was indeed pictured as, in its fullest and best form, a high-art pursuit for the few. But, as becomes clear by examining the local situation, the actual practice which upholds and perpetuates the classical music world consists of more than just these elite musicians. The local amateurs and small-scale events also play an essential part. In their case it is by no means so evident that an elite or a ‘middle class’ label is correct. Indeed my main conclusion – however banal – was that local musicians and participants in local musical activities varied enormously in terms of educational qualifications, specialist expertise, occupation, wealth and general ethos.
Some
