Is classical music elitist?
I think young people have far less exposure to classical music than I did growing up. I went to public school, and we were exposed to Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Bizet and Wagner on a regular basis. We learned about and sang classical pieces. We were expected to listen to opera and understand the stories. We were even taken to hear opera performances at the Met in NY. (I grew up in NJ.) Our teachers did not feel they had to cater to popular musical tastes. They taught the classics, because they knew these were the foundation on which today’s music was based. We also learned about Gershwin and Bernstein. We learned about jazz and blues. There was nothing elitist about any of this. Kids will always resist classical music, just as they resist learning about history, because they don’t yet understand how understanding the past opens the window to the future. Unfortunately, music education is constantly being sacrificed to budget cuts in too many school systems. Kids need to understand that cl
