Who needs classical music? : cultural choice and musical value

During the last few decades, most cultural critics have come to agree that the division between "high" and "low" art is an artificial one, that Beethoven's Ninth and "Blue Suede Shoes" are equally valuable as cultural texts. In Who Needs Classical Music?, Julian Johnson challenges these assumptions about the relativism of cultural judgements. The author maintains that music is more than just "a matter of taste": while some music provides entertainment, or serves as background noise, other music claims to function as art. This book considers the value of classical music in contemporary society, arguing that it remains distinctive because it works in quite different ways to most of the other music that surrounds us. This intellectually sophisticated yet accessible book offers a new and balanced defense of the specific values of classical music in contemporary culture. Who Needs Classical Music? will stimulate readers to reflect on their own investment (or lack of it) in music and art of all kinds.

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Building on the philosophical preoccupations of Theodore Adorno in Aesthetic Theory (1984; new trans./ed., CH, Sep'97) and Introduction to the Sociology of Music (CH, Feb'77), Johnson (Univ. of Oxford, UK) here considers the place of classical music in contemporary society, arguing that it remains distinctive because it functions differently from popular music. He cites Bach's choral music, Beethoven's piano sonatas, Brahms's symphonies, etc., which, in contrast to popular music (the Beatles, Duke Ellington), he finds to be more "redemptive," giving back to the listener "a sense of ... absolute value that a relativist society denies." In the six chapters that follow, Johnson offers a sophisticated yet accessible defense of classical music's value, arguing that it lies in being something in and of itself--and therefore essentially ethical. In view of the relatively sparse attention Johnson gives to (a very few examples of) popular music, the reader might justifiably conclude that the author's preference has less to do with the intrinsic values of each genre than with his greater familiarity with classical music. Johnson does not stop to offer foot- or endnotes, but he includes a selected bibliography and a full index. Tepidly recommended for music libraries at any level. M. Meckna Texas Christian University

Introduction	p. 3
Chapter 1. Musical Values	p. 10
Chapter 2. Uses and Abuses	p. 33
Chapter 3. Music As Art	p. 51
Chapter 4. Understanding Music	p. 72
Chapter 5. The Old, the New, and the Contemporary	p. 91
Chapter 6. Cultural Choices	p. 111
Bibliography	p. 131
Index	p. 133

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