Scholarship Shmolarship
I recently applied for a scholarship (which will not be named). The interview was uncomfortable - mainly because there were no representatives from the humanities on the panel - and reaffirmed the arguments that this blog has been espousing. As supporting documents for the application I submitted a personal statement which talked about issues of antisemitism* in music as my main area of interest; a link to this blog was also included in my CV. I would hope that all of the panelists read both, but it seems the message was lost. One panelist obviously thought they were on the ball, asking confidently: 'Should we listen to Wagner?'. This is an worn and somewhat irrelevant. Firstly, music taste is highly personal: you can listen to Wagner if you like, or not if you don't like. Secondly, I don't believe that most people who listen to Wagner (or indeed programme Wagner's music in concerts or for broadcast) do so politically. What matters more is how we talk about Wagner. ...