Good one, Tim.Not so long ago, listening to music, or experiencing any kind of art, required an investment - some kind of effort on the part of the audience that connected them more deeply to the artist. These days, much less of an investment is required. Do we value art less as a result? It's tough to say exactly how much less, but I believe that this is definitely the case.
Let me put it this way. After driving 20 minutes to go see a play, you've invested something, and therefore will make more effort to process and get value out of the art you witness. However, when you can instantly access a particular piece of art, there's no initial investment, so you're not going to really try to get inside the head of the artist and figure out what they are trying to say. Your subconscious is going to assume that what is easy to access should also be quickly accessible.
The effort of going out and buying a CD, dropping $40 on a rare record, learning the piano so you can play that one song by your favorite band - every effort you make to seek out a particular song or type of music makes you more a part of it. It's against our nature to walk away from something we've already invested some kind of time, energy or money in; we're more inclined to try to salvage it, to mine it more deeply for value.
Just be careful you don't mine too deep.For instance, if you spend $15 buying an album at the store, and upon your first listen find that you profoundly dislike it, you are going to spend a lot more time trying to prove to yourself that you aren't an idiot who got duped into buying a bad album. You're going to listen to it until you either start to actually enjoy it or decide that it really is beyond all hope. However, an album you download for free, you're going to delete and, for the most part, forget about.
Artists are keenly aware of the culture into which they are releasing their art, and I think what we've seen over the last couple years in response to the lack of audience investment is an increase in accessibility and a drop in depth. However, the lack of audience investment is largely a result of the nature of the technology with which they access music.
Well, if all of this is true, what should we do? Should we shun the promise of portable music players and online streaming? I don't think so. Really, my main purpose in writing this article was simply to bring attention to the way the medium with which we access music changes the way we perceive it. I recommend a solid four hours of uninterrupted reflective meditation on the themes presented in this article. But why should you listen to me? It's not like you paid anything to read this.
