The Year the Music Died
PERHAPS NO OTHER SECTORS have been hit as hard by the coronavirus pandemic as those that enrich and entertain us. Concert halls are closed, museums are gathering dust, and cinemas are insolvent. If your favorite sports team is playing at all, it is in an eerily empty stadium—with the effect that the game no longer offers us a thrilling escape from the world but reminds us of its crisis.
The cliché of the starving artist has gained new currency, as hundreds of thousands of people in these industries are either out of work or waiting for their furloughs to become layoffs. Then there are the ripple effects: Shuttered attractions make the recovery of tourism even less likely; children no longer learn about culture and history firsthand; and few of us are getting the creative inputs and distractions that make life both richer and more fun.
Slowly, the first venues are reopening—socially distanced, of course. Forced by necessity and powered by creativity, digital reinvention is gathering speed. Few things will be as they were. To help us make sense of a sector marked by tremendous uncertainty about the future, FOREIGN POLICY asked eight leaders and experts to weigh in with their predictions.
Reimagining Concerts
by MARK C. HANSON
, from my usual seat in Davies Symphony Hall, I listened to Mahler’s Sixth Symphony and knew it would be the final performance on that stage for a long time. The next day, the San Francisco Symphony became the first orchestra in the United States to announce the cancellation of live concerts as a result
