“Are Digital Orchestras a Sign of the Times?”

The Wall Street Journal.
Letter to the Editor
May 9, 2007; Page A15

In regard to “Classical Music: Fugue for Man & Machine” by Jacob Hale Russell and John Jurgensen (Pursuits, May 5): This is a nicely researched article that posits “virtual” music as a possible remedy for very real problems experienced by orchestras and performing groups. But I read the story with a feeling of dismay because of what it signifies about the diminished world of classical music.

To be sure, we have all heard about the declining attendance at musical events, and many fine orchestras cite this and the ever-increasing costs associated with running an orchestra as being a critical issue. As technology has advanced, as demonstrated in the article, the ability to capture perfectly the tones played by top musicians and then reuse and remix them to create a virtual program has given sound engineers the ability to create virtual orchestras. Indeed, imagine if your entire cello section were made up of Yo-Yo Ma, Slava, Feuermann, Fournier, Casals and Maisky. What a superstar program you could have, with the ability to capture the various tones of these musicians and even the differences in the timbres of their respective cellos.

The biggest problem would be to ensure that the royalty checks got out in a timely fashion.

I think that as a curiosity and as backup for dance and Broadway programming the virtual orchestra has some interesting applications. But I believe that we’ll find that the “virtual orchestra” will only lead to a faster decline in concert attendance. Patrons are interested in seeing and hearing a performance by live musicians, not a dance recital by a putative conductor prancing about the stage by himself with a baton and a rack of electronic equipment, regardless how good the musicians were who may have recorded the tones. The accomplishments in engineering cannot, sadly, stem the general decline in listenership of classical music.

As such, the only thing that will be accomplished is to make synthesized “uberorchestras” of digitally recorded tones of the superstars of yesteryear and those who are alive today. In a decade, the only performing musicians could be some moderately talented teenage girls strutting about a la Britney Spears holding million-dollar instruments while “air bowing” the Brahms violin concerto to a digitized 1955 recording from Reiner, the Chicago Symphony and Heifetz. We could even one day have the classical music equivalent of lip-synching.

What is needed is a revitalization of the culture of concertgoing and musical appreciation. This is a more difficult task, beyond the capabilities of sound engineers and finance directors of orchestras. Rather, it is something that starts in the homes and schools, with parents who think beyond what will bring a higher SAT score and school administrators who think beyond the next funding crisis or swimming pool project or computer lab to get on with the business of teaching children how to grow up to become truly educated men and women.

The cultural benefit for the concertgoer is an enjoyable performance by talented people who, after rehearsing, come together and make magic for an hour or so to the delight of their patrons. This musical curiosity, I predict, will have a niche, just as the player piano and its modern brethren still do.

David Umlauf
Deerfield, Ill.