SUMMARY FOR ARTICLE

The pamphlet asks what a democratic culture in the arts would look like, and finds the current system wanting in terms of legislative frameworks, representation, transparency, equality, and universalism. three ideas are embedded in the conversation between norman lebrecht and tom shepherd: first that collaboration between classical musicians and other musicians is always bad; second that popular success is always bad with bad here used in the sense of debased or of poor quality; and third that there is some pure category of art that is polluted a black death when it comes into contact with non-art. what is at work here is the belief that only a small minority can appreciate art and that art of quality needs to be defended from the mob. but that should not place them off limits to anyone because while the arts are special they are also simultaneously inextricably and healthily part of the everyday. cultural democracy does not imply art by plebiscite with artists cultural experts and professionals being told what to do by whimsical public input.