Jacobs School of Music live stream goes global

It is safe to say average students spend a chunk of their days checking Facebook or Twitter and watching YouTube. It is probably a lot less safe to say that average students spend a chunk of their days watching videos of jazz ensembles and live streams of operas.

The Jacobs School of Music is trying to change that by reaching out into social media. Already, the school distributes information and content though Twitter, YouTube, Facebook and www.music.indiana.edu/iumusiclive.

These sites range in purpose from basic information about the school and events to live and recorded video of performances.

“We are realizing a lot of people go to different places for information these days, so we want an active presence on Facebook and other popular websites,” Alain Barker, director of media and publicity said. “It is the way things are going for any organization. We have to be agile and ready to communicate where people naturally go.”

Jacobs is using YouTube and online video in a variety of ways, Barker said. Students and performers can embed the videos on their Facebook pages to share with friends and family. The school’s performance of “Little Women” will be directly streamed to the Facebook page Saturday. 

The other side of the school’s push into cyberspace is the IU Music Live website. This
consisted only of podcasts in its original form but now includes HD live streaming and on-demand video of Jacobs’ opera and ballet productions.

IU Music Live was initially the project of Konrad Strauss, chairman of the Department of Recording Arts. 

“I feel that the (classical) music I was raised to love and that I feel passionate about is dying, and very little is being done to build a new audience for this music,” Strauss said. “Integrating the technology into the performance is a way to bring this music to a new audience that traditionally isn’t drawn into the concert hall.”

The site will eventually expand to showcase other parts of the Jacobs musical palette, including jazz and orchestral ensembles, Strauss said.

The site already receives heavy traffic from around the world. Strauss began to track the statistics on Jan. 1 using Google Analytics.

By Oct. 1 the site had 35,913 hits from 17,260 unique viewers. The hits came from 56 countries and all 50 U.S. states.

“We’ve been getting a lot of traffic from people around the world who enjoy ballet and opera,” Barker said. “Some of it has to do with our international student population. When you have a Chinese singer onstage, her family and friends in China are going to want to watch it.”

All of the audio, camera work and video switching is done by students in the Department of Recording Arts, Strauss said.

Junior Robert Rossman directed the video for the opera production of “Il Barbiere di Siviglia.” His job was to operate a video switcher and direct three cameramen.

“I want to record music, but video experience is valuable,” Rossman said. “And to say I was part of this high-quality production by such a well-known school is great.”

The department uses HD cameras and HD switchers to record the productions. The quality of the source recording is what makes the biggest difference, Strauss said. The videos are then encoded into HD and standard resolutions.

“We just experimented with coding parameters and resolutions until we found something that worked,” Strauss said. “It took some experimentation, but the quality is no different than what you would see on Hulu or Netflix. I think as we develop the project it will become one of the prime sites to visit for on-demand streaming.”

The live streams are often accompanied by live chats and blogs by opera experts. These experts offer insight as well as musical and historical context, Strauss said. During “Il Barbiere di Siviglia,” the director blogged about his ideas and inspirations throughout the preparation for the show.

IU Music Live is not the only website to offer streams and on-demand video of opera and ballet productions, but it is one of the few that offers the service for free.

The Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco Opera and many others offer these services only as part of a paid subscription. 

The paid subscription acts as a barrier to people who are curious about opera and ballet but do not want to pay, Strauss said.

“As far as social media, we are going to continue to develop more videos and interactivity,” Barker said. “We are trying to tell the story of Jacobs.”