The same person who would ridicule someone in their 50s+ for playing in a cover band would probably not ridicule anyone at that age for playing oboe in a community orchestra.
And that double standard tells you everything. Same person, same age, same hours of practice, same joy in playing music written by somebody else — but one is considered cultured while the other, sad.
The ridicule isn’t really about the band. It’s about someone in their fifties+ visibly having fun in a way that isn’t socially correct. Whatever that means.
There’s also a quiet hypocrisy in it. Nobody asks whether the oboist wrote the Mahler. Playing other people’s music with skill and care is the entire tradition of classical music. But a cover band plays a straight banger with fidelity to the original and that’s a knock-off.
The cover band is doing something that’s harder in at least one respect. The orchestra audience shows up predisposed to reverence. The cover band has to win a room — read it, pace it, lift it — every single night, for people who came to drink and dance, not to just sit there in respectful silence. I think that’s a real craft. And if you think it’s easy I’d say just go ahead and give it a try.
The ridicule says more about the ridiculer. They’ve accepted a script where aging means narrowing — fewer joys, and none that go to eleven. Someone on a stage at say 63, playing like they mean it — and loving it — flips the script.
Aging is everyone’s problem eventually. Have fun. Play the gig 💪
