Old Art and New Art

[Helene]

In the 27 February issue of The New Yorker, music critic Alex Ross, who had attended "a program of Renaissance polyphony by the Hilliard Ensemble, in the 'Music Before 1800' series, at Corpus Christi Church [in Manhattan]," lauded concert programmers Jane Moss (Lincoln Center) and Ara Guzelimian (Carnegie Hall). Ross wrote,

[T]hey have embraced non-classical personalities:  Carnegie has hosted Caetano Veloso and Youssou N'Dour, while Lincoln Center recently featured the remarkable indie-pop singer-songwriter Sufjan Stevens, who stark religious song "Seven Swans" was strangely similar in psychic impact to the Nicolas Gombert Mass that Hilliard sang at Corpus Christi.  The idea is not to dilute classical music with crossover novelties but to move it back into the thick of modern life.  The old art will no longer hold itself aloof; instead, it will play a godfather role in the wider culture, able to assimilate anything new because it has assimilated everything in the past.

In my opinion, his conclusion couldn't be a more apt description of George Balanchine's work.