The age of age?
A century and still running? Several things have happened in the last few weeks that seem to add up to more than the sum of their random parts. These are they: Debussy in 1908 1. The centenary of Debussy's death has sparked so many recordings, concerts, etc, that it looks as if he's more popular than I thought. Debussy is wonderful, amazing, original, seminal, groundbreaking, crucial, one of the all-time geniuses, etc, yet I've never thought of him as either a special audience draw, like Mozart, or a media-friendly dead-celebrity type, like Stravinsky (who pinched lavishly from him). But the CD releases have been hitting my desk at the rate of several a week, a nice big new book has already emerged, and it's still only the middle of March. What conclusion to draw? Debussy is super-duper-popularoony after all? Or: take a centenary, any centenary, jump aboard and expect to watch sales soar? Forgive me if I sound cynical, but this is 100 years, and 100 years is, nowadays, ...