The effects of corporate music


I'm old enough to remember AOR and being able to listen to music that at the time I thought was just bizzare, and that was on the radio. There were so many stations around with a huge variety of music to hear, including things I had not heard before.

In the last thirty years music radio has changed so much, and for the worse that I no longer listen to music radio. I can't help but think that cumulus and others of their ilk have destroyed radio, but I also wonder how big their influence has been on the quality of music.

There used to be more of an edge to music, and I'm not talking about the trash made up of violence and sex that is todays rap music. People had more to say, and better ways of saying it when I was young. The musicians did not try to substitute shock for substance when making their records.

Are there still musicians around that are great artist, but we never get to know them because they don't fit the formula of corporate radio stations? Is there still a place for small stations that are unwilling to play the drivel that passes for pop music, or the oldies that comprised our youth, but are getting old even to those of us that love those songs???
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Showing 1 response by pragmatist

Having nothing new to contribute to your points about corporate effect,I'd like to consider the end of the Cold War.

As the most abstract art,music is the most difficult art to censor. A totalitarian government would rather have its free thinking,creative people making music that writing pamphlets and making trouble,so it steers many persons into music.(Kodaly's music curricula that were used throughout the eastern block are now catching on in the west.)

With the end of the Cold War,with freedon to travel,a generation of great players is more visible that it was a decade ago.

There are more great players out there than perhaps any time in history. Cuban jazz is blazing new paths that more will travel when that government changes.

The modern composers don't get commercial airplay but many orchestras slip some of their works onto their programs.

Many cross over to work in the studios for hourly pay but art musicians pushing forward their art outside of the commercial mainstream is nothing new.