Greg Stepanich

Three years and 400 posts

Three years ago this month, The Post launched its first seven blogs, all of them about entertainment: music, television, movies and theater.

Four of the original seven members of The Blog Squad are still at it (two have stopped, and one now captains a different Post blog), and this posting marks my 400th entry.

That’s not a huge amount over that time period, but we started with infrequent posts before reorienting ourselves. I also tend to write long entries, which might be against the spirit of faster-paced blogs, but most of the best-known classical music and litblogs I’ve read over the past three years have substantial entries the majority of the time, so I feel as though I fit right in.

Here are some things I’ve learned over the past three years of blogging:

1) Classical music is alive and well, and alive now as never before. The primary reasons for that are the Internet and the attendant growth of digital recording technology, which have it much easier for musicians without traditional recording contracts to make names for their selves. And that’s just one aspect of this information revolution.

The Net has made it possible for composers to have one-stop personal marketing and sales offices on their Web sites, for like-minded music fans to meet across the miles (this blog is on the blogrolls of writers in New York, California, the United Kingdom and Australia, for instance), and for devotees of this art form to discover even the most obscure repertory.

2) There is a wide audience for local classical music that is happy to travel for good listening opportunities. Doing the blog has helped get the word out about classical events in Broward and Miami-Dade counties, and I get e-mails (and some comments on the site, though not too many) about those concerts from local Post readers. This technology, then, has helped us get a better picture of the local classical audience.

3) There is a busy classical music community out there, busier and more active, in more places, than I knew. I’ve heard from people who run laptop orchestras, mount small series of chamber music, sing Renaissance music in ad hoc chorales and freelance in multiple local performing groups. That’s not to say that all these people are making a great deal of money, but what’s encouraging to see is how much of it there is.

During the season, I go to one or two concerts every weekend; last weekend, there were six I could have chosen from, and that will hold true for most of the next few months.

I’ve had a few high points in doing this blog that I look back on fondly, including:

1) Suggesting during a conversation about local music and this blog that a series of organ recitals would be a good addition to the local scene. Diana Akers and Hal Pysher agreed, and that series has just concluded its third season.

2) Meeting many local classical musicians, some of them just by e-mail. I get notes all the time about what they’re up to, from concerts to recording projects. It’s a vibrant, fascinating community.

3) Getting excerpted in Gramophone. The August 2007 issue of the world’s leading classical music magazine quoted this blog in its regular Blogwatch feature that month (the entry was my June 6 post on Dietrich Buxtehude’s daughter). That was a big thrill for me.

I’ve been accused of being too positive about classical music today, which of course has its problems. But I think a lot of critics may not fully grasp the power of music itself to have a permanent appeal outside the vagaries of the marketplace. Music will always move people, and that guarantees that some sort of classical music will survive no matter what.

As always, thanks for reading, and thanks for your comments. I’ve got a handful of new classical discs to listen to, a crammed concert calendar for months ahead, big new books about classical music to read (new bios of Schumann and Sibelius are on my shelf at home), and so I’d better get right to it.

On to No. 401.