I'm a little surprised at people here who claim to be classical music aficionados and yet haven't heard of him. I would have guessed it's hard to know enough to be able to name more than two or three classical violinists and not know who Bell is.

But I think that's beside the point, because I don't think the premise is that people "should" have recognized Bell as a celebrity. The naive hope is rather that people can recognize great art when they encounter it.

Solo violin is relatively niche in the vast world of classical music.

The reaction here shows that HN doesn't follow classical.

The reaction after (presumably) hearing some of the video . . . shows that they're not going to.

Regardless of celebrity, a classically-trained violinist and a busker are two very different things. (Buskers have more charisma!)

The whole framing is weird to me. I enjoy classical music among other things, but I'm in no way an "aficionado" (whatever that means), and I can recognize around 0 classical musicians by appearance.

> I'm a little surprised at people here who claim to be classical music aficionados and yet haven't heard of him.

How about they heard of the composers that he played the music of (Bach, Massenet, Schubert and Ponce), but not of the guy that played?

When I go and buy a Big Mac, I care that it's a Big Mac, not whether the cook that re-heated it today was Bob or Joe.

Concert soloists have their own characteristics. They often play the same piece with subtle differences and confer different feelings. Some may sound more convincing/touching than others. When I hear a version I like, I may check who is the soloist and may buy his/her album. Then I will naturally remember the name.

Cool, but I asked for a Big Mac, and so did 99.99% of the world.

You're just in the 0.01% that would have stopped and listened, just like you're in the 0.01% that would buy his album or go to his concert.

My point is that classical music soloist is a niche hobby, just like my playing cards collection is a niche hobby, and that to expect that more than 0.01% of the world would stop on their way to work to look at my playing cards collection is simply laughable. This whole article is a joke.

You quoted "classical music aficionados". I was mainly reacting to that part and explaining what an aficionado would do. A random person buying a Big Mac is not an aficionado. Also from the article, 2.5% paid, 0.6% listened and 0.1% recognized him. This is more or less in line with my expectation. I certainly know classical music is a niche hobby. When I go to some chamber music concert, I often see a room of elders, very few young audience.

Classical music is obsolete. And the dude was wearing a baseball cap.