There was a curious anti-art tirade by TV personality Melvyn Bragg in the Weekend supplement of this newspaper on Saturday, September 23rd. "Mozart vs Motown" was the headline, and the pairing of the 18th-century giant was only one of a number of pairings which juxtaposed high-art composers with later figures from the popular scene: Schoenberg vs Elvis Presley (I kid you not), Beethoven vs The Beatles, Wagner vs Van Morrison.
While Bragg's self-indulgence was primarily an exercise in self-promotion (he couldn't resist having a go at people who don't watch television - how dare they disapprove!), he purports to be buttressing an argument to prove that popular culture and high art are really one and the same thing but clouded by issues of class and poshness. How strange, then, that he gets through all those pairings without mentioning the name of a single, living composer of what he would regard as art music? The only such figure who crops up at all is John Tavener, explicitly because Bragg has done a show on him. Otherwise living exponents of art music just don't rate a mention.
Bragg's argument runs a familiar course. It's the old numbers game. Can all those millions who absorb popular culture be wrong? Is it even remotely feasible that the altogether smaller numbers who appreciate high art might possibly be on to something richer and better? Bragg, it seems, thinks not, and this, it has to be recognised, is a very heavy issue for a TV presenter who wants not just street-cred for his show but also high audience figures as well as the accolades of the intellectual elite.
He uses the fact that "millions" of people fail to create viable popular music as an indicator of the achievement of the small numbers who succeed. Unfortunately, he doesn't define that success. Is he talking commercial sales? Or is he talking artistic merit? And the argument that Pavarotti can't sing like Elvis doesn't illuminate anything. Bragg lets the cat out of the bag when offering Placido Domingo and Robbie Williams as apparent polar opposites. "To prefer Placido Domingo to Robbie Williams or vice versa is easy, and what we all do. To try to prove that preference is likely to be very tricky."
There! Now you have it. It's all about proving preferences. It's like when you were young and at school, arguing over who was the sexiest film star. May the man with the cleverest put-downs win, especially if he's in the chair. What we really need to see is Bragg bring his popular/elitist argument to bear on one of the senses not primarily involved in high art. Let's hear him explain how CocaCola compares to a fine wine, or a Big Mac to haute cuisine. I think we can safely assume he has sampled all four. The differences involved are actually in key respects similar to those he's dealing with in his core anti-art argument. The one endeavour is primarily commercial.
The other, however commercialised it may become, is actually about something else entirely. The predominance of a particular brand of cola or burgers doesn't necessarily tell us anything about the products' intrinsic quality as food and drink. Spiders and rats outnumber humans. Are they, then, the pinnacle of evolution? No. Let's hear it for bacteria.
Brian Boyd's Sleeve Notes
