OTOM, as Cicero might have texted. Yes, it's just gone Easter, and time for another Classic FM Hall of Fame for the serious classical music lover to bemoan!
(Previous Les Introuvables cover available here:
2010,
2011,
2012. Hmm, the absence of a 2013 comment shows the parlous state of this blog, doesn't it?)
So the news is that VW's Lark is back on top of the chart, thanks in large part (if one is to believe the
bumf, and why wouldn't one?) to its use in the much-watched death scene of Hayley Cropper on
Coronation Street (I didn't know this; I read it).
Yeah, that's not the news is it? Because the most important news is that Tchaikovsky's
Capriccio Italien is at no.140. No, wait, that's not it either. Oh yes: video games. Lots of game music - music from 8 games to be exact, according to
Digital Spy. The trend began two years ago with a couple of suspiciously high new entries, but Classic FM seems to have embraced the concept now, informing us:
This year's chart also revealed a huge rise in popularity in orchestral
music used in video games, with eight entries in the top 300 including
two in the top 20. Since Classic FM started playing video game
soundtracks regularly last year, the station has attracted a significant
number of new, younger listeners. In the last year alone, the number
of 15 to 24 year olds listening to Classic FM each week has grown by 27
per cent.
Ah, it was all part of a cunning plan, or something. Well sure lookit, if it gets the young folk off their mopeds and their heroin and starts them listening to Beethoven instead then it must be a good thing. Though the scientist in me wants to know, "27 per cent of what?" of course.
The games thing is part of a broader trend in the Hall of Fame, though, Back in 2010 I speculated on whether one could draw any grand conclusions from the many years of data. I wasn't so sure at the time, but looking at it now - there have been 19 charts - I notice one clear change over the years. Let's put on our nerd goggles!
Comparing the first Hall from 1996 with the latest version reveals that they have 196 works in common. Not all of these works were in every single chart; about 40 of them disappeared at some point and then returned. We can look at a few changes in fortune here. Borodin's In the Steppes of Central Asia started off at no.221 and has showed a general upward trend, peaking this year at 47. Schubert's Trout quintet has gradually sunk from no.27 to no.154, while his String quintet has had an even greater fall, from 56 to 215. Why, I wonder? I suppose the Borodin fits better into the overall "sound world" of today's Classic FM, and anyway chamber music has never been a significant feature of the Hall of Fame.
But Nereffid, I hear you grunt, what is this "sound world" of which you speak? Well. Let's look at the pieces that were in the Hall of Fame in 1996 and aren't in the 2014 one, and vice versa.
Here's what's been lost:
Beethoven Fidelio
Beethoven Triple
Concerto (Violin, Cello and Piano)
Beethoven Violin sonata
no.5, Spring
Bellini Norma
Berlioz L'Enfance du
Christ
Boccherini String
Quintet (Minuet)
Brahms Symphony no.2
Chopin
Fantaisie-Impromptu in C sharp minor
Delius Walk to the
Paradise Garden
Donizetti Lucia di
Lammermoor
Dvorak Serenade for
Strings in E
Elgar Coronation Ode,
op.44 no.6, Land of Hope & Glory
Elgar String Serenade
in E minor
Elgar Violin Concerto
Franck Panis Angelicus
Gluck Orfeo and
Euridice
Gounod St Cecilia Mass
(Sanctus)
Hummel Trumpet Concerto
in Eb
Mahler Symphony no. 3
Mahler Symphony no. 4
in G
Mendelssohn Elijah
Mendelssohn Symphony
no.3, Scottish
Monteverdi Vespers
Mozart Horn Concerto
no. 4 in Eb
Mozart Mass no.18 in C
minor, Great
Mozart Piano concerto
no.27
Mozart Sinfonia
Concertante in Eb
Mozart Symphony no.39
in Eb
Offenbach The Tales of
Hoffman
Paganini Violin
Concerto no. 1 in Eb
Pergolesi Stabat Mater
Prokofiev Symphony no.1
in D (Classical)
Puccini Turandot
Purcell Dido and Aeneas
Ravel Daphnis et Chloe
Rossini Barber of
Seville
Saint-Saëns Intro and
Rondo Capriccioso
Saint-Saëns Piano
Concerto no. 2
Schubert Symphony no. 8
in B minor (Unfinished)
Strauss R Der
Rosenkavalier
Vaughan Williams
Symphony no. 1 (A Sea Symphony)
Verdi La Forza del
Destino
Verdi Rigoletto
Vivaldi Mandolin
Concerto RV425
Wagner Siegfried
That's a pretty solid list of standard classical repertoire, isn't it?
OK, brace yourself.
Here come the works that appear in 2014 but not in 1996:
Addinsell Warsaw
Concerto
Armstrong Romeo and
Juliet
Bach Cantata BWV208
'Sheep may Safely Graze'
Bach Cello Suites
Bach The Well-Tempered
Clavier
Badelt Pirates of the
Caribbean
Barber Violin Concerto
Barry Dances with
Wolves 'John Dunbar Theme'
Barry Out of Africa
Beethoven Coriolan
Overture
Bernstein Candide
overture
Binge Elizabethan
Serenade
Binge Sailing By
Brower World of
Warcraft
Bruch Adagio
appassionato for violin & orchestra, op.57
Coates Dambusters March
Debussy Arabesque no. 1
Debussy The Girl with
the Flaxen Hair (Preludes)
Delius Florida Suite
Dvorak American Suite,
op.98b
Einaudi Divenire
Einaudi I Giorni
Einaudi Le Onde
Elgar Pomp and
Circumstance 4 in G major
Elgar Salut d'amour
Finzi Clarinet Concerto
in C minor
Finzi Eclogue
Finzi Five Bagatelles
Gershwin Walking the
Dog
Glass Violin Concerto
Godfrey The Mirror of
Love
Gold Doctor Who
Grieg Lyric Pieces
(Wedding Day at Troldhaugen)
Handel Sarabande
Hawes Fair Albion
Hawes Highgrove Suite
Hawes Quanta Qualia
(Blue in Blue)
Haydn Cello Concerto
no.1 in C
Hess Ladies in Lavender
Hess Piano Concerto
Jenkins Adiemus (Songs
of Sanctuary)
Jenkins Palladio
Jenkins The Armed Man -
A Mass for Peace
Khachaturian Masquerade
Kirkhope Banjo Kazooie
Kirkhope Kingdoms of
Amalur
Kirkhope Viva Pinata
Lauridsen O Magnum
Mysterium
Litolff Concerto
Symphonique no. 4 in D minor
Long Embers
Long Porcelain
Long The Aviators
Long To Dust
MacCunn The Land of the
Mountain and the Flood
Marquez Danzon no.2
Maxwell Davies Farewell
to Stromness
Mitchell Seven Wonders
Suite
Morricone The Mission
(Gabriel's Oboe)
Mozart A Musical Joke
Mozart Adagio for
Violin in E, K261
Mozart Bassoon Concerto
in B flat
Mozart Piano Concerto
no.11 in F
Parry I Was Glad
Parry Jerusalem
Pärt Spiegel im
Spiegel
Piazzolla Libertango
Rachmaninov Piano
Concerto no. 1 in F# minor
Ravel Piano concerto in
G
Satie Gnossiennes
(No.1)
Schubert Impromptu no.3
in G flat (Impromptus, op.90)
Shimomura Kingdom
Hearts
Shore The Hobbit
Shore The Lord of the
Rings
Shostakovich Assault on
Beautiful Gorky (The Unforgettable Year 1919)
Shostakovich Jazz Suite
no.1
Shostakovich Jazz Suite
no.2
Sibelius Andante
Festivo
Soule The Elder Scrolls
(Skyrim)
Stopford Do Not Be
Afraid
Stopford Irish Blessing
Stopford Lully, Lulla,
Lullay
Strauss, J II Die
Fledermaus
Sullivan The Yeomen of
the Guard
Tavener Song for Athene
Uematsu Final Fantasy
(Aerith's Theme)
Ungar The Ashokan
Farewell
Vaughan Williams Five
Variants of Dives and Lazarus
Vivaldi Concerto for 2
Mandolins RV532
Wagner Gotterdammerung
Walton Crown Imperial
Whitacre Lux Aurumque
Whitacre Sleep
Whitacre The Seal
Lullaby
Williams & Doyle
Harry Potter
Williams E.T. The
Extra-Terrestrial
Williams Jurassic Park
Williams Saving Private
Ryan
Williams Schindler's
List
Williams Star Wars
Wintory Journey
Wiseman Wilde
Zimmer Gladiator
Zimmer Inception
Zipoli Elevazione
Yes, we've lost Vivaldi's Mandolin concerto and gained his 2-Mandolin concerto. We've lost Siegfried and gained Gotterdammerung. We've lost one Strauss's Rosenkavalier and gained another Strauss's Fledermaus. And, yay, Bach cello suites!
But observe the presence not just of the games composers but also of John Barry, Howard Shore, John Williams, and Hans Zimmer; Ludovico Einaudi and Karl Jenkins; Patrick Hawes, Nigel Hess, Helen Jane Long; Philip Stopford and Eric Whitacre.
We can call this a trend, can't we? A gradual evolution from a list full of what you might call regular classical music, towards something rather more like... well, I tend to call it "Classic FM sort of music". And so Classic FM's listeners are, increasingly, not "people who like classical music" but "people who like the music on Classic FM". Perhaps in another 10 years the change will be so great that it won't make sense for a classical music blogger to write about the Classic FM Hall of Fame!