(Un)popular music and young audiences: Exploring the classical chamber music concert from the perspective of young adult listeners

This empirical study explores the responses of 40 young people to a chamber music concert, considering how their greater experience of popular music listening formed a frame of reference for their responses to live classical music. Using qualitative methods including the ‘Write-Draw’ technique to investigate the young people’s responses before, during and after the concert, we demonstrate how the emotional, responsive listening of popular music conflicted with the etiquette of the concert hall and the structures of classical music. Our study sheds new light on the continued decline of young audiences for classical concerts and presents a challenge to music education to equip young people for all kinds of live musical experience.