Sex and Violins

Okay, I know I'm taking a chance here that I'm going to piss people off, but I was doing some web-searching recently for stuff about Sarah Chang, who played recently with the Honolulu Symphony Orchestra, and I came across one of the greatest classical-music sites I've ever seen: Beauty in Music.

It's a website devoted to sexy classical musicans.

And I just love it! I have always thought classical musicians were just SO sexy. I am always telling my friends that the sexiest part of a woman's body is her brain. I love intelligent women, and musical (or any artistic) virtuosity is one of those mysterious, ethereal kinds of intelligences that really get me excited. What's sexier than brainy excellence?

Rock and roll (one of my three favorite things in the whole world) has always been about sex--hence its name--and yeah, it's not JUST about sex, but it's an art, and art necessarily deals with the experiences that make us human. Especially those experiences that all at once DEMAND to be talked about and dealt with and yet DEFY the words you'd need in order to do so.

That's why all the great novels and poems and songs and paintings are about sex, dying, religion, love, jealousy, anger, and small-yet-poetic moments of revelation. In America, at least, classical music has a stuffy, boring connotation, despite the fact that it is the rawest, sexiest, most passionate, most sensual art I can think of.

So I've been conflicted, just about all my adult life, by my attraction to women who are excellent musicians. The very FACT that a woman plays the violin is sexy to me, but I've never wanted to think about these classical musicians the way I've thought about Lita Ford or Belinda Carlisle or Shania Twain, because it seems to cheapen (or somehow lessen) them as honest-to-goodness musicians with talent that transcends such superficialities as physical appearance. This is not to say that Lita Ford, Belinda Carlisle, and Shania Twain are not honest-to-goodness musicians with real talent, but they perform for audiences that celebrate sex as part of the experience, as compared to classical music audicnes, which seem to be confused by sex as part of the experience.

Yet lately, young female classical musicans have embraced (some would say exploited) their sex-appeal, communicating it in promotional photographs and on album covers, and there's been a lot of discussion about it; some of which you might like to read here, or here, or here.

I really don't know how (or if) I expect any of you to respond, but I know I can't be the only guy here who has a thing for female cellists, so at the very least, I'm happy to pass along the link.

Comments

Treading carefully here, of course, but I had to respond! I helped a friend organize the recent Ahn Trio concert, and I had many similar thoughts. These are girls with considerable classical talents, but whose marketing is built on their looks. Not a single outfit you'll see them wear costs less than several hundred dollars.

The Ahn Sisters (a.k.a. the "Seoul Sisters") are from Korea, but they're in many eyes Asia's answer to Europe's Bond quartet. In their glossy photos, they don't even bother carrying their instruments.

And while you don't see her around as often as you used to, Vanessa Mae was one of the biggest crossover "classical" beauties. Jen would make me change the channel every time one of her performances would come on TV!

Of course, we have one of our very own talented and beautiful artists in the HawaiiStories ohana...

D'oh! Hit submit before I'd gotten to the all important "However..." So:

However, when you say, "So I've been conflicted, just about all my adult life, by my attraction to women who are excellent musicians. The very FACT that a woman plays the violin is sexy to me..." I have to point out that all the artists referenced (and more directly ogled on the website you linked) aren't exactly ugly. The Bond girls are both "conventionally beautiful" (if you go for the look) as well as musically talented (if not virtuosos).

I'm probably wrong - I usually am - but classical music sales and marketing used to be based entirely on one's musical training (Julliard), affiliation (Boston Symphony), or critical acclaim. A list of credentials is impressive, but it doesn't look that exciting on a CD jewel case.

So, now headshots are everywhere. Reclining on pianos. Staring intensely off into the distance. And I would offer Vanessa Mae, the Ahn sisters, the Bond girls, and their peers - and their prominence in discussions like this - as proof against part of your hypothesis. That is, that on some level they are the same as Lita Ford or Belinda Carlisle or Shania Twain. The same superficial machinery that puts Brittney Spears' looks above everyone else's talents in pop music is likely at work in today's classical music world - or at least, the sector that's seeking more mainstream appeal.

Apropos of not much, one of the better blog taglines on my list is "Gratuitous Sax and Violins."

Classical is just the most recent, though; think of female jazz singers. Diana Krall comes to mind; she's not averse to looking great while interpreting wonderful music. Many of the re-issued CDs of Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday and others tend to use "glam" shots on the covers.

Oops. That tagline should be "Gratuitous Sax and Senseless Violins."

And Diana Krall interprets wonderful music wonderfully well.

Diana Krall is a fave of mine, also. Another fave is saxy Candy Dulfur (sp?). But, alas, I don't seem to recall any releases after the early 1990s. Guess I could google on that but I'm a pooped Tutu! Great "visuals" are mandatory to help sell great (or otherwise!) audio!

Ah, the first soprano in years to impress me as much as Maria Callas did looks as good as she sounds: Renee Fleming.

Of course, Maria wasn't exactly ugly either.

(Hmmm, I wonder if Renée will produce the accented e the way it does in standard HTML?)

Hey, it worked!

What I meant was:
Ren-&-#-233-e
without the dashes, produces the accented French e.

http://www.renee-fleming.com/is where I learned that little trick.

On Windows it's Alt-0233 for accent aigu (slant right) and Alt-0232 for accent grave (slant left). I don't have the URL, but I found an entire table of those once and copied it into a text file.

Classical music brings in less than 5 percent (probably by now, less than 1 percent) of a (major) label's total revenue. For the longest time, classical music labels have marketed to the same audience -- older, highly educated. Thing is, that audience isn't growing, and if the little label that's part of an international conglomerate wants to justify its existence to a distant board of executives, it needs to show a bottom line.

Kronos Quartet was the first classical ensemble to embrace rock music marketing, and it found that elusive young audience. (My co-workers from the record store looked rather odd sitting next to season subscribers.) Ever since, the classical music industry has attempted to replicate that success to varying degrees of success, including but not limited to using sex.

I plead guilty to buying compilations of classical music because the cover sported bare-chested men.

It should feel strange to buy a Russell Watson CD based on his looks -- the classical music recording industry hasn't wanted to resort to marketing sex but now it must.

(Not surprisingly, classical music has been shut out of the file-sharing phenomenom since most pieces take up lots of hard drive space, which means long download times. So any claims that file sharing helps to push music purchases most likely don't apply to George Szell conducting Beethoven's Ninth.)

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