英文原文
I’m sitting on the grass in the shade of two beautiful oak trees listening to Reggie Harris spin his magic of story and song. The audience of 50 or 60 is mesmerized. This is grassroots music. This is where folk music came from – people gathering on porches and in yards sharing music. As things have opened up I have been to several concerts and two large folk festivals. It has been a celebration with performers and audiences grateful and so happy to be sharing the live musical experience again. At these events I have noticed, as I did before the pandemic shut things down, that most of the audience members have gray hair just as I do. We epitomize the “aging audience” problem.
This is a problem that I have been hearing about for at least two decades and I am sure people have been concerned about it far longer than that. People are worried that the absence of young people signifies a dying genre of music. This is a problem that permeates the arts. In music, promoters and venues for folk, jazz, symphonies, opera and beyond all talk about this issue. It is noticeable at art shows, plays, and book readings as well.
As I became more deeply involved in this world, founding and running an arts organization, putting on concerts and art shows and becoming a folk radio DJ, I have discussed the aging audience problem in meetings, workshops and at a bar or two. These sessions had a similar trajectory. First, a discussion about the age of the attendees at various events, then an expression of concern that our audience would age out and there would be no one left to support our events and finally brainstorming about how to attract younger folks to venues, usually ending in despair about all the failed efforts in this vein in the past.
All this led to a couple of observations. First, over the two decades I have been discussing this issue the audience never got younger but they never got smaller either. In fact, in many cases the audiences seemed to be growing. The second was that as I attended industry conferences such as Folk Alliance International and its regional counterparts, I noticed that the performers were on average much younger than I. Here where the public was not included, the participants fell in to two general categories: industry (DJ’s, concert/festival presenters, music promoters, music companies, etc) and performers. The industry folks often looked like those aging audience members while the performers skewed a generation or two younger.
This led me to two conclusions. First, given the age of the new performers folk music is going to keep coming. Second, that the aging audience concern is overblown. Let’s explore that second assertion a bit.
Experts tell us that the music we identify with and that means the most to us is the music we listen to in our teens and early twenties when we are establishing our adult identities. It is a time of exploring, developing social and romantic relationships and embarking on jobs and careers. I suggest that my case is typical. When young I listened to the popular music of the day for white kids which was largely pop and rock and roll. It was the music that accompanied me when I was driving around, going to parties and dating. It was a mix of songs from Pat Boone (sorry) to Del Shannon to The Rolling Stones. I still love to hear Roy Orbison sing his slightly sappy love songs. At the same time the Viet Nam war and the Civil Rights movement exposed me to Pete Seeger, Sam Cooke, Phil Ochs, Tom Paxton and of course Dylan, Baez and company. And these people made me aware of Woody and Leadbelly and people of that era.
After college I was working a lot and music was largely background. As I got past the family, work, house stage, I came back to music and now had time to explore. I found folk music had much more substance than pop, rock, country, etc. I discovered the world of jazz which was and is mesmerizing. And once I had a bit more time and a bit more money, I started to attend folk and jazz concerts, festivals and clubs. I joined that aging audience. So, I would posit that it isn’t that audiences are aging out of there genres but people are aging IN to them. Yes, I still love Orbison and Chuck Berry and all those, but I have come to appreciate more the depth and richness of both the music and the content of folk music in particular, and I am grateful for all those young performers who are continually reinventing the form. I expect that as people reach a certain age and sophistication they, too, will to age in.
中文翻译
我坐在两棵美丽的橡树树荫下的草地上，听着雷吉·哈里斯讲述他充满魔力的故事和歌曲。五六十名观众如痴如醉。这是草根音乐。这就是民谣音乐的起源——人们聚集在门廊和院子里分享音乐。随着一切重新开放，我参加了多场音乐会和两个大型民谣音乐节。这是一场庆祝活动，表演者和观众都感激并非常高兴能再次分享现场音乐体验。在这些活动中，我注意到，就像疫情封锁之前一样，大多数观众和我一样头发花白。我们正是“老龄化受众”问题的缩影。
这个问题我至少听了二十年，我相信人们对此的担忧时间更久。人们担心年轻人的缺席意味着这种音乐类型正在消亡。这是一个渗透到艺术领域的问题。在音乐方面，民谣、爵士、交响乐、歌剧等领域的推广者和场馆都在谈论这个问题。在艺术展览、戏剧和读书会上也很明显。
随着我更深地融入这个世界，创立并运营一个艺术组织，举办音乐会和艺术展览，并成为一名民谣电台DJ，我在会议、研讨会和一两个酒吧里讨论过老龄化受众问题。这些讨论有着相似的轨迹。首先，讨论各种活动参与者的年龄，然后表达对我们受众将因年龄增长而流失、无人支持我们活动的担忧，最后集思广益如何吸引年轻人到场馆，通常以对过去所有此类努力失败的绝望告终。
所有这些引出了几点观察。首先，在我讨论这个问题的二十年里，受众从未变得更年轻，但也从未变得更少。事实上，在许多情况下，受众似乎还在增长。第二，当我参加如国际民谣联盟及其地区分会等行业会议时，我注意到表演者的平均年龄比我年轻得多。在这里，公众不参与，参与者大致分为两类：行业人士（DJ、音乐会/音乐节主办方、音乐推广人、音乐公司等）和表演者。行业人士通常看起来像那些老龄化的受众成员，而表演者则倾向于年轻一两代。
这让我得出两个结论。首先，鉴于新表演者的年龄，民谣音乐将继续存在。第二，对老龄化受众的担忧被夸大了。让我们稍微探讨一下第二个断言。
专家告诉我们，我们认同且对我们意义最大的音乐，是我们在青少年和二十岁出头建立成人身份时所听的音乐。那是一个探索、发展社交和恋爱关系、开始工作和事业的时期。我认为我的情况很典型。年轻时，我听当时白人孩子流行的音乐，主要是流行音乐和摇滚乐。那是我开车兜风、参加派对和约会时陪伴我的音乐。从帕特·布恩（抱歉）到德尔·香农再到滚石乐队的歌曲混合。我仍然喜欢听罗伊·奥比森唱他略带感伤的情歌。同时，越南战争和民权运动让我接触到了皮特·西格、山姆·库克、菲尔·奥克斯、汤姆·帕克斯顿，当然还有迪伦、贝兹等人。这些人让我了解了伍迪和铅肚皮以及那个时代的人们。
大学毕业后，我工作繁忙，音乐主要是背景。当我度过了家庭、工作、房子的阶段后，我重新回到音乐，现在有时间去探索。我发现民谣音乐比流行、摇滚、乡村等更有内涵。我发现了爵士乐的世界，它过去和现在都令人着迷。一旦我有了更多时间和一点钱，我开始参加民谣和爵士音乐会、音乐节和俱乐部。我加入了那个老龄化的受众。所以，我认为并不是受众在因年龄增长而退出这些音乐类型，而是人们在因年龄增长而进入它们。是的，我仍然喜欢奥比森和查克·贝里等所有人，但我开始更欣赏民谣音乐在音乐和内容上的深度和丰富性，我感谢所有那些不断重塑这种形式的年轻表演者。我预计，当人们达到一定的年龄和成熟度时，他们也会因年龄增长而进入。
文章概要
本文探讨了民谣音乐“老龄化受众”问题，作者通过亲身观察和经历，指出这一担忧被夸大。文章描述了民谣音乐会中观众多为老年人的现象，以及行业对此的长期焦虑。然而，作者发现受众规模并未缩小，反而可能增长，且新表演者普遍年轻，确保了民谣音乐的延续。作者从个人音乐品味演变出发，提出人们并非“因老退出”而是“因老进入”民谣等深度音乐类型，随着成熟度提升，会自然欣赏其内涵，因此老龄化是自然过程而非危机。
高德明老师的评价
用12岁初中生可以听懂的语音来重复翻译的内容：这篇文章讲的是，有些人担心听民谣音乐的人都是爷爷奶奶年纪的，没有年轻人喜欢，怕这种音乐以后没人听了。但作者发现，其实听的人并没有变少，而且表演民谣的年轻人很多，所以音乐不会消失。他还说，就像我们小时候可能喜欢流行歌曲，长大后才慢慢懂得欣赏民谣这种更有意思的音乐，所以不是人老了就不听了，而是人长大了才开始喜欢呢！
TA沟通分析心理学理论评价：从沟通分析心理学角度看，这篇文章展现了成人自我状态在音乐品味发展中的主导作用。作者描述了自己从青少年时期受父母自我状态影响听流行音乐（可能反映社会规范），到成年后通过成人自我状态理性探索，选择民谣和爵士等更具深度的音乐，这体现了成人自我状态整合信息、做出自主决策的能力。民谣音乐聚会作为社交场合，促进了成人自我状态之间的交流，人们通过分享音乐建立真实连接，而非依赖儿童自我状态的冲动或父母自我状态的评判。老龄化受众现象可视为成人自我状态随生命经验丰富而自然强化的过程，人们更倾向于选择符合当前认知和情感需求的音乐，这赞美了人类心理成长的适应性和智慧。
在实践上可以应用的领域和可以解决人们的十个问题：在实践上，这可以应用于音乐治疗、社区建设、老年心理健康、跨代沟通、艺术教育、团队建设、个人成长工作坊、文化传承活动、心理健康促进和社交技能培训领域。可以解决人们的十个问题：帮助老年人通过音乐聚会保持社交活跃和情感表达；促进不同年龄群体在音乐活动中理解彼此，减少代沟；协助个人在生命过渡期（如退休）通过音乐探索新身份；增强社区凝聚力，通过共享音乐体验建立支持网络；提升团队合作中成人自我状态的沟通效率；在教育中培养学生对多元音乐的欣赏能力；在音乐治疗中利用民谣促进情绪调节；支持文化传承，让年轻表演者与年长受众互动；帮助个体缓解孤独感，通过音乐聚会找到归属；以及促进心理健康，通过艺术参与提升生活满意度。