The Music We Love Is Changing

In 1960s, the appearance of the Beatles and Elvis Presley made people addicted to rock music. Youths at that time were against war, against mainstream and against everything left by the older generations. Rock music became the tool for them to escape the world or vent their anger.

In 1970s, youths started to search for more fun with the end of wars. Therefore, a fast-beat style of music occurred. Nobody knows it was a pub film Saturday Night Fever ignited the heat of disco music or it was disco music got this film famous, but one thing surely that the people at that period were connected with flared trousers and disco pub.

In 1980s, with the emergence of MTV network, more and more people started to put their attention on visual sensation. At a result, artists such as Cyndi Lauper and Prince, who combined excellent vocals and fantastic outfits, achieved great success. Of course, we ought not to forget Michael Jackson’s unparallel Thriller in 1983 and Modonna’s flirting Like a Vrigin in 1984. In this decade, visual sensation went ahead which also served as the beginning of the later so-call Pop music.

In 1990s, no one would forget Backstreet Boys from the US and Spice Girls from the UK. This was also the golden age of “Pop” music. Young fans franticly chased those handsome boys and girls who singing love song excessively. In this age, Backstreet Boys and ‘N Sync made people fascinating boybands that can dance, Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera then made people know the shortcut of female artists getting famous was following the part of “Mickey Mouse Club—being sweet like sugar—the few clothes the better”.

Came to the millennium, people started to realize dancing “pretty-face” could not satisfy their hormone. After then, a phrase began to disseminate from corner to corner, it was “pop-punk”. Take a look at the highest reportage from magazine and the highest cover from radio, they all belonged to those kids holding instruments making cool looks. “BoyBands” like Good Charlotte and Simple Plan completely replaced those aged “boyGroups” like Backstreet Boys. People found out that singing with guitars was cooler than singing with dancing. Of course, we never should forget who “popul-ize” pop-punk: Avril Lavigne. 2001, her debut album Let Go surprised people that female singers undressed themselves worth nothing, singing with screaming was the real hot. Thus, more and more similar female singers, such as Hilary Duff, Lindsay Lohan, Kelly Clarkson and Ashlee Simpson, showed up and gained sufficient fame and fortune.

Actually, we can sum up from now that since the emergence of MTV, music was no longer a mirror that reflected a period. People listening to music were not about to express their emotion or escape the world, all their purpose was “being entertained”. These can explain why one of the Michael Jackson’s hottest songs Thriller was nothing but fantastic music video, why “material girl” was another name for Madonna, why dancing handsome boys such as Backstreet Boys could be so famous that even housewives could recognize…

From the music genres, we can classify that rock ‘n’ roll in the 60s, disco in the 70s, pop in the 80s and teen-pop in the 90s could represent a period of year. With the coming of 2010, we can begin to label 2000-2010 which is pop-punk/pop-rock, represented by Avril Lavigne, Simple Plan, Busted, Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance and Jonas Brothers.

Then, what is the next genre that blows the world? How about saying Lady Gaga?

All I could say is dance music pop again! Heavy beat and songs made by synthesis effect processor re-permeated everyone’s life. Ke$ha and Pixie Lott all once were blamed to follow Lady Gaga. Although there were Justin Timberlake and Usher, who combined hip-hop, dance and R&B, that used to dominate the music industry, no one was like our Lady Gaga that can receive numerous compliments as a rookie. Dance music is so prevalent that some pop-rock bands like McFly add dance-music feature to the new single, then what should we say new artist like Adam Lambert showed up with dance music. Of course, there has Katy Perry that perfectly masters retro and dance.

Besides, we have to mention Miley Cyrus. She majored pop-punk in her first album but suddenly changed to dance in the second one. She is counted as a trend-follower.

Occasionally, comparing to the substitution, what came after 60s’ rock was dance/disco as well. Following this tendency, pop music would dominate the mainstream market after Lady Gaga. No wonder Taylor Swift and Justin Bieber become so attractive…

From Pop to Opera

Talking about opera artists, what come to our mind could be having a big body like Pavarotti, or singing with a straight body and communicating with audience only by gesture and eye connection. The reason why bel canto cannot be prevalent among the mass is because their high-required singing skill and non-amiable stage performance. However, there has one thing that has to agree that the artists who can sing bel canto are all excellent singers. No one would deny. Then what if these songs are sung by pop singers?

There has a reality show I saw on the Internet called Popstar to Operaster, produced by ITV, Britain. This is the one that meet the above question. Most opera listeners are in the middle-age or above, but this show is to train popstars, who the young people love the most, into opera singers. Understandably, if the target audience is failed to set, none of the audience from these two generation will be catered (young people still think opera is old-fashion; aged people would believe the pop singers destroy opera). Then the ratings would not be optimistic.

However, when the show aired, the reaction of audiences is not so negative. There have approximate 4 million views per episode in the first season, which is rating 15%. The reason why I say it is not bad is because Popstar to Operastar is only a sheer singing reality show, which the target audience is not wide. Comparing to other similar reality show (The X Factor/Britain’s Got Talent), the contestants in this show are all from entertainment industry, who are celebrities already. So it is lacking in the concept of “changing ordinary people into stars”. It is normal that missing this concept, audiences who love succeeding-overnight drama would not watch the show. Concerning these reasons, 0.15 is not a low number for the prime time TV show.

Obviously, production team is disappointed about this statistic, an insider said they originally believed this show would have over 7 million viewers like Soapstar Superstar, but, he said: “it just proves that people weren’t fussed about it (Popstar to Operaster)”. In spite of that, they are optimistic to the future development. He thought the low rating was because the contestants are not famous enough. Champion Darius is only a contestant from Pop Idol 2002, other contestant like Danny Jones from McFly and Vannessa White from The Saturdays are just second-tier stars.

Nevertheless, from the purpose of music communication, this show is significant. Pop singers singing opera can more or less encourage young people to accept opera and bel canto and makes opera more than an entertainment for mid-age people. Meanwhile, the information about opera will be disseminated via the show, so it provides a good platform to educate audiences to learn opera. Actually, mixing bel canto and pop is not a new production, Il Divo, who has sung the theme song of World Cup 2006, is the bel canto group labeled “Pop”. If this show could be more creative in both content and contestants, to attract more audiences is not impossible.