Sounds Boring: An Inquiry into the Origins of an Idea About Classical Music

Classical music has had a mixed reputation for quite some time. Although many see it as the ultimate form of music, one of the dominant ideas in the discourse on classical music (both as genre and as a cultural field with its own set of rules) is that it is boring. The central question in this article is when, why, and how classical music became associated with boredom. In their attempt to provide the field and the genre with a bright future, some scholars have explicitly addressed the issue of boredom. There has been some “empirical” research on the topic, with most studies claiming that emotions in general, and boredom in particular, have a static and universal meaning. Inspired by recent insights from the relatively new field of the history of emotions, this paper interprets the emotional effects of, and emotional responses to music as social constructs that are highly dynamic. Analyzing a wide variety of sources that suggest a relation between classical music and boredom, this article explores who exactly related classical music to boredom, and with what arguments. Particular attention is paid to the (changing) perceptions of the genre and the field of classical music, as well as boredom. Concentrating on the emotion’s “causes”, the article reveals the history of the reputation of classical music as a genre on the one hand, and the rules and habits of the field on the other. It also pays attention to the “solutions”, which often offer very specific interpretations of boredom too. Considering emotional labelling as a social process that is deeply connected to distinction, the article shows that a better understanding of the historicity of this specific discourse offers new insights to those who hope to “save” classical music.