"Back in 2008, Transport for London came up with a ruse to dispel antisocial behaviour: it piped classical music into supposedly problematic stations in the crime hotspots of south London. I think that was when I realised just how far the association of classical music with relaxing affect instead of real emotion had gone. Once an entire genre has become associated with relaxification, it's enough for you to hear the sound of an orchestra and think, This isn't for me."
"The playlist included the finale of Beethoven's Seventh Symphony music that is obsessive and wild, the sound of barely controlled hysteria, full of harmonic grind and rhythmic assault. This radical and Dionysian music, that was literally made to push communities of orchestras and listeners to their extremes in the early 19th century, was being reduced to calming and inoffensive aural wallpaper."
Transport for London piped classical music into problematic stations in 2008 to dispel antisocial behaviour, revealing how classical music has been linked to relaxing affect rather than real emotion. Entire genre associations turn orchestral sound into background, luxury signaling, and cultural anaesthetic. Even Beethoven's Seventh, a radical, Dionysian finale of obsessive, wild sound, can be reduced to calming, inoffensive aural wallpaper. Contemporary AI music prompts and streaming playlists favour arpeggios, hyper-mic'ed pianos, slow tempos and bland textures. Cinema and television commodify classical music as a readymade signifier to elicit pseudo-emotions, repeatedly reusing tracks for maximum chills.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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