Classical Music and…Social Media?
Three dots in ellipsis marks may not look like much, but for many people it is harder to connect the dots between classical music and social media than to bake a cake.
If you ask the common man (or woman) what classical music is, they will probably say Mozart, Beethoven, concert halls and people in tuxedoes waving all kinds of sticks. What they will probably not say is followers, Instagram Live or blue ticks that certify you as a person with a certain amount of gravitas.
But, as with everything else, this has all changed in 2020, the year of the pandemic. In such surreal times, music can no longer be heard in concert halls; people no longer have to dress up to attend concerts; standing ovations are replaced by sparse claps, or even mini versions of John Cage’s “4’33” (i.e. silence).
All this sounds pretty depressing for fans of classical music, but is this really the end for hours and hours of practising? And will not some change for the better come out of it? Of course!
Pandemic Performances
At the start of the pandemic and the first wave of lockdowns, many classical artists turned desperately to livestreaming themselves. This would involve putting a phone at the corner of a piano or a music stand (hopefully with selfie mode on!) and pressing the live button on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter. From hereon their interaction with technology ceases, and they focus solely on their own playing.
Now all this is well and good, if the people watching on the other side of the screen had had to pay to watch their performances. But no, most of the livestreams were free of charge, and soon classical artists also had to reckon with the fact that world-class virtuosity paired with iPhone recording quality just doesn’t quite cut it in the world of social media.
Survival in the Safari of Social Media
In the wild safari of social media, competition is fierce. It is a dog-eat-dog world, a world where influence and followers are everything. In this gruesome arena, classical artists must reckon with other species of musicians which the sound-proof walls of concert halls have for many years shielded them from. Pop singers, hip-hop artists, funk-jazz-futurist producers, afrobeats curators, and of course, DJ Khaled.
But some classical artists have braved the storm and adapted their style on new turf. Not only has this kept them “in the game”, so to speak, but also helped spread the gospel of classical music to a greater number of people. In many ways, they have evolved and created a new generation of classical musicians that embraces the times.
And with that characteristically long exposition, I would like to pay homage to some of the greatest classical musicians on social media.
(P. S. I chose Instagram because I am on there most of the time, and also because Facebook is so 2010, and also because I don’t use Twitter. Forget Tik Tok. But then again Instagram is owned by Facebook…)
(P. P. S. I play the piano so I’m biased towards pianists. Sorry not sorry.)
4. Alice Sara Ott
Instagram name: alicesaraott_official
Niche: Quirky but classy
She’s funny, she’s cute and she’s EXTREMELY GOOD at playing the piano. Alice Sara Ott showed her great potential early on in her career. She banged out all of Liszt’s Transcendental Etudes in a recording when she was only 21! But what I really admire about her is that she doesn’t have her head in the clouds just because she has this amazing talent.
Scroll through her Instagram profile and you’ll see that she’s very willing to share with you different aspects of her life. She loves doing all kinds of quirky challenges, like the #pianodaychallenge where you film yourself playing a piece but with hands swapped. She’s also super funny, as you can see in the video she posted on Christmas Eve 2020. She’s even collaborated with Z2 comics and Deutsche Grammophone to release a graphic novel about Beethoven!
All in all, I love her for being unafraid to embrace something that is not conventionally linked to classical music and showing the human side of being an artist – it’s not just about playing every piece perfectly!
In fact, something she said from this brief interview (specifically from 2:10 to 4:30) really struck me. She basically said that with technology being able to perfect recordings to the decibel, it is easy to forget the human side of music-making. This resonates with me greatly and it’s something I keep in mind all the time when performing.
Through Instagram, I think Alice has found a way of conveying such a message.
3. Ray Chen
Instagram name: raychenviolin
Niche: Cringey but cool
Yes, I do find some of Ray Chen’s Instagram reels a bit cringey, but I’m a classical music snob that way. Ray Chen is an incredibly versatile Internet personality: he has no problem acting in his little skits, making hilarious facial expressions and cracking (sometimes) dad jokes, but at the same time his hairstyle is so on point that, matched with a tux, you can’t help but see him as a Taiwanese James Bond.
His humour is very much sound effects, meme faces and moments where the video pauses and zooms in on his -.- face or something like that, but I love how he fully embraces this style! His YouTube videos are very much in the style of Taiwanese, Japanese, Korean or Hong Kong reality TV. Very entertaining!
But not only is he funny, he’s done some pretty creative stuff using this Internet personality of his. The Offstages series he did was pretty interesting (Alice Sara Ott was one of the guests!). He invited famous artists to have livestream chats with him while commenting on videos of performances etc., very much like how gamers livestream. Also, he has his own merch which is pretty cute! Not to mention his collaborations with TwoSet Violin are always the talk of the classical music town!
All of this omits the fact that he is a PHENOMENAL violinist (and the only one who features on this list ;)) Like Alice Sara Ott, I love Ray because he shows being a classical musician can be so much more than just playing your instrument well.
2. Igor Levit
Instagram name: igorpianist
Niche: Too cool for school
Igor Levit is one of my recent obsessions. He is not only one of my favourite Instagram personalities, he is also one of my favourite pianists currently. I first heard him play from his tremendous recording of Bach / Beethoven / Rzewski variations, recorded with Sony Classical, and I was completely blown away. He is incredible. Go watch him play; his recordings are everywhere.
Unlike Alice and Ray, the image Igor fashions for himself on Instagram is the cool guy. Much like some megastars on social media; I’m thinking Billie Eilish, or Timothée Chalamet, or Justin Bieber. Captions with no emojis. Captions with one word. He often posts random photos on his Insta stories and you’re like what and he won’t explain. I think an article called him the rock star of classical music.
But the thing is, he IS cool. He expands his vision beyond classical music. He is an artist who interacts vigorously with the real world. He attends political rallies, he appears in environmental campaigns playing the piano, he reads a lot, he cycles.
But all the while he is deeply in love with his own art, and his cool persona gives his followers a look at more “alternative” classical music. He steers us away from Chopin Ballades and Rachmaninoff Concerti into the realm of Bach Partitas, late Beethoven, late Brahms, Erik Satie…
During lockdown, his 52 house concerts gained more than a million views, and just showed the sheer amount of repertoire he has at hand. I have so much to say about him I’ll just save it up for another post.
Igor is an inspiration.
For those of you who would like a more in-depth portrait of Igor by a much better writer, here it is.
1. Tiffany Poon
Instagram name: tiffanypianist
Niche: where YouTube and classical music meets
I don’t believe any article about classical music and social media (which is a rare topic in itself!) would be complete without mentioning Tiffany Poon.
Unlike the previous artists, who are already established in their careers, Tiffany is of Generation Z, i.e. the generation that grew up with social media. She is still an up-and-coming artist, albeit an amazing one already. Thus, she wields social media as her weapon of choice in a much more different style.
For Tiffany, social media doesn’t show an aspect of her personality APART from her performance; it IS part of her performance. She regularly does livestreams, QnAs, even videos of her sightreading on the spot. All these ways of bringing classical music to a wider range of audience has helped deconstruct a lot of myths surrounding classical music which I believe has somehow added a lot of unhealthy (sometimes unnecessary) elitism into the industry.
I began following Tiffany when she first started vlogging herself and she really has come a long way. Not only has she gotten so much better at editing videos, being confident on camera, she’s managed to secure a lot of opportunities most artists wouldn’t be able to get (which is a sign of the industry seeing potential in social media). During the pandemic, she even raised money for frontline health workers through her charity performances and she has since started her own non-profit organization to promote classical music which I think is really cool.
Tiffany is a real hustler too! She posts daily, and puts in hard work to grow her own social media presence. I admire and respect that effort a lot. I so look forward to seeing what the future holds for Tiffany!
Do check out her YouTube channel too! That’s where most of her followers are.
Needless to say…
One thing not mentioned quite enough as I introduced these four great artists is the fact that they are INCREDIBLE MUSICIANS. Top quality. Best of the best. I talked a lot about how they present themselves on social media because to be a great artist nowadays one mustn’t merely be good at playing. But of course, the prerequisite to being a great artist is to be good at one’s craft.
These four musicians have shown me that there is not one singular way of becoming a musician, and there are many ways to make life more interesting for yourself as a musician. But ultimately, it is the love for music which drives them to do what they have done, and that is truly inspiring for me.
Literally Left-handed 
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