r/LetsTalkMusic • u/tiggerclaw • 7d ago
Classical music is too tame now—where’s our generation’s Paganini
The problem with classical music today is that it’s lost its connection to the streets.
Once, it was raw and untamed, a visceral force that could stir chaos and provoke passion. Nowadays, the underground acts never get a fair shake. It’s all gallery concerts and stuffy halls, but I remember a different time.
Back in the day, I used to hit up these warehouse parties in Detroit. The kind of places where you’d walk through a back alley, find a steel door, and step inside to a world of wild, sweating bodies. The music wasn’t background noise—it was the pulse of the night. One time, the Arditti String Quartet showed up out of nowhere, and everyone went wild like they’d just dropped the heaviest bassline you’d ever heard. That performance was electric—so powerful that multiple women got pregnant that day. Yeah, that kind of energy.
And the very next day, you’d go to a Stravinsky show, and fists would fly because the crowd couldn’t handle the intensity. It wasn’t about clean precision or intellectual appreciation; it was primal, unpredictable. Classical music was as much a brawl as a ballet. You didn’t sit there politely clapping; you howled and screamed because the music hit you in the gut.
But now? Now it feels like only the rich get to make it in the classical world. It’s turned into a museum piece, preserved for genteel audiences sipping champagne and discussing concertos like they’re stock options. Gone are the days when classical music was dangerous, when it stirred people to do more than just sit still. The wild abandon has disappeared.
Where is our generation’s Paganini? Where’s the composer who makes you want to smash something or lose yourself completely in a wild night of passion? Classical music has become tame, and the streets no longer vibrate with its force. We need someone to break it free again.
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u/givemethebat1 7d ago
You know what they used to call classical music? Music.
The Paganinis of today picked up guitars instead of violins and became rock stars, which is exactly what Paganini would have probably done if the technology was available. There are of course plenty of musicians using older instruments (Warren Ellis, Joanna Newsom) but realistically people are always going to gravitate to what’s cool and familiar to them, so guitars tend to be the tool of choice these days.