Plenty of countries have a ‘Classic FM’ radio station, including Australia which has ABC Classic FM, but the Classic FM I grew up with was the UK version and it was an institution. I hated it as a kid: it was boring, it was old. Forgive me, I was 7 years old. I liked Bros.
But video games have genuinely added a fresh sense of new life into classic music — young people are engaged with it, old fans sort of respect it. Classic FM just announced its reader voted Hall of Fame, a 300 strong list its calling a “celebration of the nation’s favourite classical music”, and video games were well represented.
Incredibly, two actually made it into the top five: The Elder Scrolls series came in at number five and the Final Fantasy series came in at number three.
I suppose it is possible that Classic FM took the route of classifying every single vote for specific tracks in each series into one, which would account for the high placement, but I’d prefer to see it as a celebration of just how mainstream video games are becoming among older demographics.
Regardless, it’s pretty cool.
Rachmaninov and video games triumph in Classic FM Hall of Fame [ClassicFM]
Thanks Omikron!