The ‘Whiteness and Racism’ of Classical Music

If you’ve spent any length of time becoming good at something, it’s rather depressing to acknowledge that artificial intelligence is destined to prove the death of it. Obviously as a writer, I’m concerned that the neural networks will inevitably outsource my ability to procrastinate, drink tea, and occasionally come up with a half-decent one-liner.

Evidently, I am not alone. Many hard-working professionals are similarly feeling the pinch. Even selling your minge on OnlyFans may soon become a thing of the past, once the silicon beasts start using push-up bras to hide their silicone implants, and get their catfishing up to scratch. Alternate avenues of employment therefore are going to be needed – a fact not lost on Corbynite OnlyFans model, Victoria Thomas Bowen, who assaulted Nigel Farage with a banana milkshake outside a Wetherspoon’s pub in Clacton earlier this week. Whether this impromptu audition qualifies her for a prestigious role at McDonald’s remains to be seen; but if nothing else, at least it proves not all Labour voters are workshy.

One industry likely to prove more resilient to the ravages of AI than most, is race-grifting. I say this because firstly, those involved orchestrate both the supply and demand sides of the ledger; and secondly, it’s not yet clear whether the machines of the white man will be allowed to self-identify as black. Thank Christ then for brave academic luminaries like Kehinde ‘The Psychosis of Whiteness’ Andrews, Dr Shola ‘Only white people perpetuate racism’ Mos-Shogbamimu, and Priyamvada ‘White lives don’t matter’ Gopal, who carry the can for white-bashing in the face of such flagrant, colonial AI oppression.

Academia in general however, is bricking it at the thought of becoming obsolete. Having spent a millennium peddling an education you could have received gratis in a library (and now can get via ChatGPT), clearly something must be done; and nowhere is this more palpably felt than the discipline of music. With AI now capable of committing a rock album to paper faster than Kurt Cobain committed suicide, institutions are scrabbling around desperately for some other means to add value to the debate.

Cue the Royal College of Music, South Kensington’s go-to gangsta rap ghetto, which is now offering a course on the “whiteness and racism” of classical music – a course designed to address the ‘Eurocentric’ and ‘heteronormativity’ of the genre. Sickening, isn’t it? If only evolution would have championed musicians oblivious to their surroundings, or conductors attempting to perpetuate the species by poking their batons at the wrong section of the orchestra.

Naturally, the course is steeped in Critical Race Theory, which will ‘teach’ students about ‘racist and Eurocentric structures’, alongside ‘the hegemonic position of Western classical art music’, while incorporating themes such as ‘colonialism, racism and the oppression of musical expressions.’ And what marvellous music will graduating students be able to produce you may ask? Course outcomes include ‘being able to be ‘anti-racist’’, thinking of music ‘in relation to geopolitical hegemonies’, and ‘having an awareness of how race, gender and sexuality will influence their careers’. In other words, they’ll be qualified for sod all, unless you count poncing around London cosplaying jihad and BLM as a vocation?

Even if you take the universities seriously in their shameful obeisance to the lowest common denominator (and there’s no reason why you should), what on earth is the classical music alternative to the ‘white, male, European figures, who influence how the artform is perceived’? How about we upgrade Ode to Joy by accompanying it with the lyrics of Cambridge University black scholarship founder, and all-round good guy, Stormzy:

I don’t use a shank, I got money in the bank

Man, I’d rather do a drive-by (dickheads)

No amount of artificial intelligence could achieve that degree of nuance.

If the Conservatoire, the Royal College of Music and the universities generally, truly believe themselves to be bastions of colonialism, privilege and racism, then there’s a simple solution available to them: as of Monday, each and every one should be disbanded; their assets stripped, their chairs abandoned, their alumni outcast, their endowments withdrawn, their bricks and mortar bulldozed and razed to the fucking ground.

Any takers?

Frank Haviland is the author of Banalysis: The Lie Destroying the West, and writes a Substack here.

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