State of the Blog Address

Responses to Lebrecht: Jessica Duchen On an Overgrown Path Adaptistration listen.

It would be remiss of me not to mention this, although it does not really concern us. In his latest column (A walk on the web side, November 8), Norman Lebrecht dismisses classical music blogging on the basis of a handful of blogs. Sadly, Ionarts was not even lucky enough to have dirt thrown at us. (One of the blogs Lebrecht claims he read, High Notes by soprano Geraldine McGreevy, was last updated on October 18. For some reason, he also mentions Terry Teachout, who is no longer really concerned with classical music.)

I am mystified, once again, why a print critic would level charges of amateurism against bloggers. Lebrecht criticizes one blogger for holding a job as a real estate agent, but Lebrecht's qualifications to write about music are, strictly speaking, no better. Marc Bridle did a pretty good job of assessing Lebrecht's background in the interview with him a few years ago. What is the difference between someone who works in real estate and someone who got his start in broadcasting and news? Lebrecht backed into writing about music and does so with no academic expertise, but he has strong opinions and that is why people, myself included, read him.