Re:When Beethoven Met Goethe
by xgk on Thursday August 10, 2017 @10:34AM
(#14980080)
I'm not really pushing any specific notion of genius, but was challenging the
claim that B. would be making techno today.
I agree, "there's got to be something convincing", but it's unlikely to
be musical. Most musicians who have a hit at all have but one hit, and
then fade away. Most of the few musicians who persist (eg Rolling
Stones) have a massive and well-capitalised marketing department
behind them. To a pretty good approximation no
musician without major backing (which is expensive) has ever been
widely and/or long-term successful. To understand the nature of hits,
you need to understand the music industry.
Coincidentally, the music
industry follows the SV VC model: fund 100, expect 99 to fail and the
one unicorn who makes it big recoups (more than) the cost of the 99
failures.
I agree, "there's got to be something convincing", but it's unlikely to be musical. Most musicians who have a hit at all have but one hit, and then fade away. Most of the few musicians who persist (eg Rolling Stones) have a massive and well-capitalised marketing department behind them. To a pretty good approximation no musician without major backing (which is expensive) has ever been widely and/or long-term successful. To understand the nature of hits, you need to understand the music industry.
Coincidentally, the music industry follows the SV VC model: fund 100, expect 99 to fail and the one unicorn who makes it big recoups (more than) the cost of the 99 failures.