{"id":8857,"date":"2014-05-20T15:55:41","date_gmt":"2014-05-20T19:55:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/?p=8857"},"modified":"2014-05-22T16:10:24","modified_gmt":"2014-05-22T20:10:24","slug":"classical-rocker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/?p=8857","title":{"rendered":"Classical rocker"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"LD_020414_DVickerman_0269\"
Assistant Professor of Music David Vickerman experiments with how audiences engage with classical music. Photo (c) Lynne Delade<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

TCNJ\u2019s Director of Bands David Vickerman wants to change the average person\u2019s perception of classical music concerts\u2014and he\u2019s not above using a little eye candy to do so.<\/p>\n

\u201cI go to rock concerts and leave being blown away not necessarily by the music, but by the experience and the feeling,\u201d says the assistant professor of music. \u201cThat\u2019s what I want to do for my audiences \u2014 bring the artistic experience back to them. I want them to walk away talking about it, feeling something, being affected in some way, shape or form.\u201d<\/p>\n

To this end, Vickerman has been experimenting with how audiences engage with classical music through his work conducting TCNJ\u2019s Wind Ensemble and the Washington, D.C.\u2013based Great Noise Ensemble. During shows, for instance, he might bathe audiences in complete darkness, then use lighting and multimedia to enhance the listening experience. \u201cI think the visual stuff provides, for lack of a better term, \u2018eye candy\u2019 to pay attention to while listening to the music,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Another way he\u2019s bringing classical music to modern audiences is through undertakings such as \u201cThe Sgt. Pepper Project,\u201d which he shepherded for Great Noise. For that, the ensemble commissioned composers to write music inspired by the classic Beatles album. Vickerman, who conducted the premiere last fall, said recently that such shows engage people who wouldn\u2019t typically attend classical music concerts. \u201cWe can tap into something because almost everyone has heard a Beatles song. It\u2019s kind of like that gateway drug [to classical music],\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

The response to his work has been positive on both sides of the conductor\u2019s stand.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe students buy into the concert so hard that the performance is better; it feeds on itself,\u201d says Vickerman.
\nAs for audiences: \u201cOne woman came up to me about one of the pieces we played; she wanted it to be played at her funeral. She wasn\u2019t talking about the video I did with it, or the lights I did with it; she was talking about the music.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

TCNJ\u2019s Director of Bands David Vickerman wants to change the average person\u2019s perception of classical music concerts \u2014 and he\u2019s not above using a little eye candy to do so. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":280,"featured_media":8858,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[69,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8857","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-spring-2014","category-on-campus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8857","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/280"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8857"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8857\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8858"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8857"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8857"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8857"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}