Sunday, December 10, 2017
Time for "Name That Conductor..."
While listening to a Boston Pops CD, "A Christmas Festival," yesterday, I remembered an early '80s moment from the TV game show, "Tic Tac Dough." Host Wink Martindale asked a contestant to name the longtime Boston Pops conductor. The contestant didn't know that Arthur Fiedler was the conductor, but I did, having checked out several Boston Pops Christmas albums from the library. I still think it speaks well of the show's question writers that they assumed a contestant would know Fiedler's name. With the possible exception of "Jeopardy," I doubt that any TV game show today would expect contestants to know Fiedler's name or the name of the ensemble's longtime current conductor, Keith Lockhart. Although that doesn't indicate the downfall of civilization, it's still slightly unfortunate.