[continued from previous message]   
      
   entertainment industry even noticing until it has already happened. That   
   will be how this story ends: not with the marginalization of new music,   
   but with something radical emerging from an unexpected place.   
      
   The apparent dead ends of the past were circumvented the same way. Music-   
   company execs in 1955 had no idea that rock and roll would soon sweep away   
   everything in its path. When Elvis took over the culture—coming from the   
   poorest state in America, lowly Mississippi—they were more shocked than   
   anybody. It happened again the following decade, with the arrival of the   
   British Invasion from lowly Liverpool (again, a working-class place,   
   unnoticed by the entertainment industry). And it happened again when hip-   
   hop, a true grassroots movement that didn’t give a damn how the close-   
   minded CEOs of Sony or Universal viewed the marketplace, emerged from the   
   Bronx and South Central and other impoverished neighborhoods.   
      
   If we had the time, I would tell you more about how the same thing has   
   always happened. The troubadours of the 11th century, Sappho, the lyric   
   singers of ancient Greece, and the artisan performers of the Middle   
   Kingdom in ancient Egypt transformed their own cultures in a similar way.   
   Musical revolutions come from the bottom up, not the top down. The CEOs   
   are the last to know. That’s what gives me solace. New music always arises   
   in the least expected place, and when the power brokers aren’t even paying   
   attention. It will happen again. It certainly needs to. The decision   
   makers controlling our music institutions have lost the thread. We’re   
   lucky that the music is too powerful for them to kill.   
      
   This story was adapted from a post on Ted Gioia’s Substack, The Honest   
   Broker. ??When you buy a book using a link on this page, we receive a   
   commission. Thank you for supporting The Atlantic.   
      
   Ted Gioia writes the music and popular-culture newsletter The Honest   
   Broker on Substack. He is also the author of 11 books, including, most   
   recently, Music: A Subversive History.   
      
   https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/01/old-music-killing-new-   
   music/621339/   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)