Standard repertory and established artists and ensembles still dominate the field, but performances of music by living composers have increased sharply over the past 10 years, according to Bachtrack, the British website that tabulates performances of classical music and dance worldwide.
The site, which promotes itself as “the largest classical events finder online,” listed 16,336 concerts, 9,271 opera performances and 5,702 dance events last year.
Between 2013 and 2023, Bachtrack reports, the share of performances of contemporary music in classical programs rose from 6 percent to 14 percent worldwide, with especially marked increases in the US (from 7.5 percent to 20 percent), Great Britain (from 6 percent to 15 percent) and The Netherlands (from 5 percent to 16 percent).
“The rise in performances of contemporary music has gone hand in hand with a rise in performances of music by women composers,” the site notes. Four of its 10 most-programmed contemporary composers in 2023 were women. (John Williams topped the living-composer list.)
Performances of early and baroque music have decreased sharply in the US and Britain in the past decade, while remaining steady in European countries. J.S. Bach was the only pre-classical composer among Bachtrack’s top 10 in 2023.
Last year marked the 150th anniversary of Sergei Rachmaninoff’s birth, and his music topped Bachtrack’s orchestral-performance chart: The Symphonic Dances was the most performed work; the Piano Concerto No. 3 ranked second, and the Piano Concerto No. 2 was fourth. Other top-10 works include Dvořák’s “New World” Symphony (No. 9), Beethoven’s Third, Fifth and Seventh symphonies, Brahms’ Fourth, Tchaikovsky’s “Pathétique” (No. 6) and Stravinsky’s “Le sacre du printemps” (“The Rite of Spring”).
The most frequently performed piano concertos, other than the two Rachmaninoffs, were Schumann’s and Beethoven’s Fourth. The top violin concertos were Tchaikovsky’s and Mendelssohn’s. The top cello concerto was Dvořák’s.
In Bachtrack’s listings, the world’s most active orchestras were the Berlin Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony Orchestra and New York Philharmonic. Most active performers included conductors Andris Nelsons, Klaus Mäkelä and Paavo Järvi; pianists Kirill Gerstein, Daniil Trifonov and Seong-Jin Cho; violinists Augustin Hadelich, Renaud Capuçon and Joshua Bell; and cellists Sheku Kanneh-Mason, Gautier Capuçon and Nicolas Altstaedt.
Verdi, Puccini and Mozart were the most frequently performed opera composers, accounting for nine of the 10 most-programmed titles (Bizet’s “Carmen” was the tenth). Tchaikovsky’s “The Nutcracker,” “Swan Lake” and “The Sleeping Beauty” were the three most-staged ballets.
Bachtrack’s summary of performances and programming trends is here:
http://bachtrack.com/classical-music-statistics-2023
(via http://artsjournal.com)
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