Theodor Adorno says that popular music is ‘standardized’ and that the popular music industry ‘churns out mass produced, inferior commodities’. There certainly is an area in the music industry that creates music purely for the sales figures, but there is also popular music that was created in the same way people create art. Something that evokes emotions, something people can relate to which something that is a genuine piece of self expression. That type of music I feel can be defined as a genuine art form. This then raises questions as to who is the artist in this scenario. If somebody doesn’t write their own song are they the artist, or is it the songwriter. I think that both can be classified, as the songwriter creates the words and the performer expresses them and if the audience can take a genuine emotion or can connect with the song, both have succeeded in creating a genuine art form.
This distinction between creator and interpreter in popular music is an interesting one as this is surely an even more natural occurrence in the 'serious' classical music so beloved by Adorno.
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