A shameless co-opt

I have to get this off my mind. Every time I see the latest Rickard's Red commercial I feel a level of contempt and horror I haven't felt since the Dairy Producers of Canada slaughtered Beethoven's ninth to get people excited about milk. I know it's all perfectly legal, but every fiber in my being rails against this commercial for how wrong it is. I wish I could find a version of it online so you could see it. It was bad enough when they used Carl Orff's O Fortuna Carmina Burana, to sing about how wonderful their beer is, but now, now they have gone too far for me to be silent.

Pause for a moment and listen to this. This is the Dies Irae from Mozart's Requiem in D minor, one of the the more famous sequences in the Mass for the Dead. The requiem is considered by many to be Mozart's superlative work, which is quite a thing to say as very little of what he created was less than gorgeous.

Even though I am not a believer, the requiem is one of my favourite pieces of art. A requiem is a prayer for the salvation of the souls of the dead, commonly used at funerals and memorials. So those who are using it to pray for the souls of their departed loved ones may have a different kind of connection to it. Me, I think it's exceptionally beautiful and emotive and as such I hold in very high regard.

Now I don't want to say that art and advertising can't intermingle. They can, but it has to be done right. Ads can be art and sometimes art can be co-opted in a tasteful manner to sell something, even exposing people to music they'd never heard before and exposing an artist to an entirely new audience. I think that can be amazing when it works. Rickard's Red does not have the right product or the right brand status to be co-opting the Mozart's Mass for the Dead. I couldn't give you an example of who does because it would have to be the most valuable, beautiful and amazing thing ever made.

Personally I feel that the art co-opted should reflect the quality of the brand that chooses it and it should never sully the original in the process. Art should be used to enhance, not to defame.

When they change the lyrics of the Dies Irae from the original Latin to the basic descriptions of beer that could have been written by a seven-year-old, for me it's the equivalent of breaking into my home and painting over my print of Nuit Etoilee to make it look like Dogs Playing Poker.

And it's too bad, because there are elements of the commercial that are pretty amusing. The storm, the wind and the rain engulfing the bar, meshing with the drama of the music and the looks on the faces of all the actors. There's something good there that was executed the wrong way.

Every time I see it, the music snob that I am dies a little on the inside. Kind of like the time when I was working at the music store and a woman came in demanding the "Drink milk, love life" song. Which is a co-opting of the Ode to Joy from the 4th movement of Beethoven's 9th Symphony. Usually when people came in looking for the song I would point them to Beethoven and send them merrily on their way. But this woman wanted the actual "Drink milk, love life" jingle! OH. MY. GOD.

I understand why advertisers choose classical music. People recognize the melodies, the music isn't copyrighted so it's free to use and in many cases, it's amazing music that really connects with people. But it a sad, sad day for culture and art when it's not done right. Boo to you Rickard's Red and your parent brewery Molson. Nothing goes unpunished.

HRH