BAYREUTH, GERMANY AT WAGNER'S FESTSPIELHAUS DURING THE SUMMER FESTIVAL PERFORMANCES OF WAGNER'S MUSIC DRAMAS there is adjoining the FESTSPIELHAUS dining for all and sundry, covering every taste bud. MUSIC and FOOD together satisfy the spirit, the health and can inspire the loftiest of projects and plans generally. Commercial business activities have for eons it seems had businessmen luncheons at night clubs where music and food together foster mutually encouraged deals. I am a Wagnerian romantischer heldentenor, opera composer: "Shakespeare" & "The Political Shakespeare" & the director of the Richard Wagner Music Drama Institute, where professional actors are trained for the Shakespeare roles and big-voiced singers are coached in the Wagner roles, voice production and dramaturgy techniques. I may be reached by phone at the Institute. My next concert in New York will be on Saturday, June 9th at the YOGA EXPO at the SOHO venue at the New Yorker Hotel. The title of the concert is BRING HIM HOME, with that song from the musical LES MISERABLES, encouraging the return of our armed forces and inspiring hope and love of country with This Land is Your Land, The House I Live In, You'll Never Walk Alone, Climb Ev'ry Mountain, Billy Bigelow's Soliloquy from Carousel, Granada, The House I Live In, Wien, Wien, nur du Allein, The Impossible Dream [The Quest], Empty Chairs at Empty Tables, Do You Hear the People Sing?, When Johnny Comes Marching Home, Kumbaya, Earth Anthem and eight other selections.

Have to say I'm finding a lot of the counter-arguments weirdly austere and reactionary: from what we're hearing, supposedly music is art, but food isn't; music can transport us in a way that cooking can't; music can foster a sense of community, but food (somehow) falls short of that; music heightens our awareness, but food doesn't. Really? Does anyone actually believe all that? Yeah, sure, the "foodie" movement has its excesses (news flash: so does the music world; Google Van Halen + M&Ms), but can't a great meal (from either a four-star restaurant or a neighborhood ramen joint, from either a taco stand or some European temple of molecular gastronomy) expose us to many of the same communal and creative virtues that we also find in songs? In the end, the (admittedly twee and probably already tired) "food is the new rock" shtick really just boils down to the idea that these days, more than ever, an uptick in gastronomic consciousness is expanding our panorama of awareness and delight. How can that be a bad thing?

Agree with "Prospect Park Neighbor"...Googa Mooga was too big a footprint for our park. Park events have, historically, been free and OPEN to anyone who could show up. This one took place behind high fences. Technically it was free -- if you got to the website on time. Making park events more about the "space" of the Internet and less about the physical space of the park, keeps out the communities that surround the park. People in the community couldn't go because, as the show pointed out, the whole thing (including the advertising that drove people to the "free" tix on the website) was aimed at W-burg and Manhattan. And friends who attended complained the food was super-expensive. Have no problem with the idea of a food festival, or with honoring the "stars" of any cultural realm that has its adherents, but, if you're having the event in a public park, keep it open and keep it accessible and affordable. And if it's gonna be tens of thousands -- think about holding it in private space, not on precious and environmentally delicate parkland.

Food may be the new rock but it certainly is the new pornography.
Talk about your Lost Generation!

I love food and music, but food becomes excrement after a while. Music stays with me for a lifetime. I can't whistle the taste of a chicken wing. At any rate, what a ridiculous discussion!

Does rock really live at festivals? It does, but shares the stage with community, culture, arts, and plenty of other activities. Bringing the growing foodie movement (which reaches MUCH farther than just trendy Williamsburg restaurants, and shame on the speaker for pulling the hipster card on the work of the movement the other workers in the food industry) to festivals makes comeplete sense. It also makes a lot of money for event organizers and food businesses, while making crowds happy.

If you want to rock in the purist sense, don't expect it at a festival. Go to a rock show.

Hey, thatgirl, digging many of your points, and really enjoyed the whole discussion, but if you're under the impression that it's chefs who depend on "corporate backers" while well-known musicians somehow don't, well, we might have some upsetting news for you. Who's more independent, in the end — a band whose albums and songs are distributed by a vast international corporation, or a guy like Eddie Huang who makes waves by opening a downtown sandwich shop? I think one of the reasons why many chefs are perceived as being more indie is that they actually are; usually their "backers," at least when they're starting out, are just friends and family members.

stephen from crown heights - peace, brother!

thatgirl from manhattan - I'll completely agree with you there.

It is, and for as long as I can remember, has been the New Orleans Jazz AND HERITAGE Festival. In addition to at least a dozen genres of music and local(!) food specialties, you will also find tremendous art, crafts and a multitude of generations at "Jazz Fest". Far from a rock show, it celebrates and exposes the local culture to the world. (Thankfully, it also brings a lot of income to the city Bush tried to drown.) I dig all kinds of food, but the day I see a Fest booth that serves catfish and sauteed fois gras po-boys with nettles-infused mayo I'm cancelling next year's reservations.

adam - well expressed point!

alex from harrison - i understand your point, but it misses the point of discussion: that "chefs" (and their corporate backers) are the new rock stars, and their offerings, the new rock (or that which would replace it). no doubt we have exciting conduits in which to engage in foodstuffs and dishes--for those who appreciate good food, they are wonderful oases. however, prioritizing it over music as a draw, in the fashion googa mooga proposed, just reduces it to a wasteful, thoughtless frenzy.

as for opportunities to discuss music, social media (including broadcasts/sites such as this) does offer an opportunity to discuss music. the few live venues where music can be heard here (the ones that don't resemble arenas, anyway) are also viable. see also: music stores, where those who love it (rather than simply consume it) gather with some frequency.

Alex from Harrison, NY~

Great point.

Still sick of the foodsterisim, though.

I feel like restaurants, farmer's markets, wine shops, have filled the void left by record stores and nightclubs.
I can go to my neighborhood farmer's market and have a serious and exciting discussion about leeks, or visit
a place like the Meat Hook in Brooklyn and geek out over offal. There's nowhere left to do that with music.

There's a sense of community involved that both your listeners and commentators seem to have underplayed.

P L E A S E ! ! !

NO MORE BACON/PORK BELLY/PIG FETISHISM!!!

kids... please give it a rest.

The answer is no! Music and cooking are both art forms but they are not the same thing or even similar. Even though they share a bit of a DIY ethic, it does not mean they are the same.

To equate the new foodies as rebels equivalent to the rebels of rock is preposterous and means you have a rather poor understanding of both rock and food.

I've been hearing "food is the new punk rock" which is equally ridiculous. The aesthetics and economics of punk and the new food movement are radically different. Punk is about greasy fish-n-chips and lousy beer, both preferably nicked from your friend's side of the table. To the punk, food is merely sustenance, not art or theater.

It should also be noted that people are STARVING all over the world and nearly 35K children die every day to do diseases that mostly arise and become fatal from a lack of food and clean water. With this in mind, I find it despicable to become a food snob or a foodie. While I do enjoy a good meal, by I try to keep things in perspective and enjoy time at Burger King as much as time at a Jean Georges restaurant. One should be very thankful to have ready access to food and to a variety of food and should be very concerned when turning their nose up to any kind food at all.

Great food and music festivals isnt a new thing. The new orleans jazz fest has the best food anywhere and its a big reason why the fest is so good but it never replaces music as the main topic. It's an awesome compliment to the music not a replacement or a competitor, like Jennifer Lopez's behind. The group that organized GoogaMooga are well aware of jazz fest as they started in new orleans

Great food is great and great music is great but saying foodie culture is the new rock n roll is more annoying then when people say "do you like LA or NY better?" Anyway, good music deserves more respect because its taking something you don't need to live, literally, and making it feel like you can't live without it whereas as good food is just taking something you need to live an making it better.

i don't get, why food has to of necessity be associated with fat. that's part of our wrong headed notion about food in this country.

stephen from crown heights - trust that our "food culture" isn't enriched by something someone inhales off a paper plate after standing on line at an overblown "music" festival with beer in a plastic cup. the culture would be better served to be connected to how food arrives on the table, rather than fetishizing "rock star chefs" who are producing the equivalent of "factory outlet" versions of their famed offerings for silly events like googly moogly (and really--who came up with that stupid name?). good food should be enjoyed at a pace and in a place that doesn't force someone to eat it as quickly as possible.

Googa Mooga: Food First, Music Second? WHO CARES?

The Great Googa Mooga turned Prospect Park into a garbage pit. What a disappointment. It's a park for wildlife, too, not a fair ground for fancy "foodies" who most likely scared all the migrating birds/park's animals half to death. The festival was like a tornado of gluttony. GG took over the only bit of nature we have left in this area of Brooklyn and trashed it, tearing up the grass, leaving broken glass, hunks of bones, piles litter, etc. And three days later, the garbage is still there. It was and still is disgusting. #gluttony #moneymoneymoney

How 'bout the notion that chefs are pathetic rock star wannabes??

...real "outlaws".

Rock-on, all you Marco Pierre Whites!!!

More cleaver tats, more Zeppelin!!

...duuuude!

Full refunds for all extra mooga buyers?!! Now I wish I had bought one do I wouldn't have spent 90 min waiting for a $16 beer.

There is a very big difference between food and rock. We need food to live plain and simple. Of course we are going to eventually get better and better at making and enjoying it. We will never need rock to live but nonetheless we will always have it in our souls and lives.

Maybe because I'm vegan, I didn't see the point of Googa Mooga. It was a glorified "Taste of" festival, except for only with hipster restaurants. I went for the band anyway, but what's communal about waiting in line for an over priced tiny serving of food you can get a couple miles away at the restaurant's actual location?

I didn't hear Hamilton acknowledging the whole new audience that the food offerings bring to the music festivals. Music is art and good food is art. Both can bring tears to your eyes if they're great. It's better to serve nitrate free hot dogs and natural drinks than crappy warm beer and bad junk food.

Yes, some chef's egos are too big already and putting them in a rock venue only makes them grow bigger!

I was going to go, but no matter how good the menu is, serving food for 1,600 + people can't be done well in the heat unless you have a really great logistics team.

And how old is food? (OK, so even gourmet food....)

Food is not replacing music in any way, though it is having a revolution therefore becoming as relevant to our cultural lives as music. The two certainly compliment each other, shouldn't be mutually exclusive and also should be respected individually.

BBQ don't travel quite as fast as the speed of sound/music, but they are perhaps more pervasive. Great example is the Madison Square BBQ fest or the BBQ and Blues festival down South where you have both the intoxicating fumes floating through the air at the same time you hear those wonderful Blues sounds. Two different parts of the same cultural heritage!

While I agree that food being the new rock is clearly an oversimplification and an over-generalization, one cannot and should not discount the new cultural gravitas that food now wields. Hamilton, I'm sorry to tell you, but for many people, food IS more important than rock. No one is saying that they should, but it's true. But, one thing Hamilton should keep in mind is that food can be way more intimate to one's experience than music. This is a value question. And I'm sorry, but I can't say that I'm really all that upset about this development, and what it portends for our collective food culture.

unlike mp3's which, no matter what the music is, are always at an accessible pricepoint of $1.29 or so, or radio which is always free, music is accessible to people of all economic strata. but good food is not. what if you can't afford restaurants the way affluent 20-something williamsburg rich kids can afford? does that mean your tastes are not elevated? or are you just middle-class? i don't buy the argument that foodie-ism is the new rock.

As someone who went to CBGB's in the 80's...we had the perfect Jersey solution...rock and roll concert followed by a diner at 3 am.

New Orleans Jazz Fest, need I say more?!! Jazz Fest not only has one of the most popular lineup EVERY year! BUT IT ALSO FEATURES SOME OF THE BEST EATS!!! Beats and Eats, what else could a fan ask for?? Delicious music :)

Why does music and food have to be mutually exclusive or Elitist? I recall that my foodie movement started with a food truck...while leaving a show because the food in the menu was indelible. Now I have five star food in my not quite gentrified Red Hook neighborhood, and rock shows at all hours to. Accommodate all sorts of schedules. Can't the movements co exist and strengthen each other? Do we have to choose to dine out or see a show?

Food can compete with music once someone figures out how to dance to it.

I think Jeff Gordonier's points about food being a big, new movement and that foodie fetishism is embraced by the young and affluent-wannabes is a problem with people's relationship with music, and vanity consumption. I'm firmly in Hamilton Nolan's camp. Music requires attentive LISTENING and some patient focus. Music as a communal experience and should supplant the other so-called necessities. All of this attention to food branding, is just another symptom of the new spiritual hedonism, but one that is mostly self-centered and is not too inconvenient to a discomfort or sacrifice.

If the heart of rock 'n roll is (was?) rebellion against the norm for the baby boomers, then maybe we gen x/y'rs are putting our creative force into work to take a stand against obesity, factory farmed animals, and starbucks/mcdonalds on every corner.
Rebellion has moved from loud and obscene to tasty and detailed.

Too much multitasking going on these days. How do you listen, eat, and text at the same time

heaven forbid any american be more than an hour (or block) away from their next meal. why must the two be combined at every cultural venue or event we attend? cafes in museums, anyone? it's one thing to enjoy a drink at a concert (which has its own negative results, relative to everyone's enjoyment), but wading ankle-deep in someone's food wrappers and plastic bottles just makes music events further polarizing.

At least with the younger demographics (of which I am part of) I can't see the interest in food being its own intentional culture. The whole artistically, organic, foodie, whatever is simply the result of looking for the best bang for your buck for that portion of every broke student's budget that we can't seem to cut out, food. Look at the rise of trendy food trucks and many smaller restaurants or specialty shops, they are relatively inexpensive but at a higher quality than many standard cafes and diners.

Its the bargain in the end, punching above one's wallet weight. The music still holds the same importance it has always had.

Ron from Brunswick -- why are Rock musicians celebrities? Same difference.

Yes, it is.

I understand that this leaves a bad taste to some. It does even to me, and I'm much too into food. (I can't say, Foodie. I just can't.)

But the culture of food and its discussion is paramount now. I keep waiting for the shark to be jumped, but people aren't living and dying over discussions of rock right now the way they're screaming over where to get the best soup dumplings.

...braugh, what "craft" brews do you have???

Gimmie a COLD fKn beer, weenie!!!

Almost everyone has had the experience of being moved to tears by a great song.
If you have been moved to tears by a great meal then you are most definitely in a different class of foodie!

I'm a waitress in NYC. There should be sessions at food festivals that teach 20 somethings how to tip (or that it's not okay to keep costs down by not tipping) and how to not split a 35 dollar check on 4 debit/credit cards.

why are chef's "celebrities"?

Since the 60's, Boomers became self-identified with their music -- Rock -- as if they owned it and deserved credit for it (never mind whether it deserved "credit" or not.)

Food is fulfilling the same void now... people puff themselves up and self-identify by becoming foodies.

Both iterations expressed slavishness to trends, and representative of shallowness.

It became about the consumer -- "look at me! You can tell I'm sophisticated because of the music/food I consume" -- instead of about the thing itself and those who actually created it.

Oooga Booga or whatever the hell it was called was absolutely RETARDED!!

As is all forms of the current foodsterisim!

This from someone who works in the food industry.

zzz!!

...sorry... I fell asleep as I was retching.

No, food is not the new "rebel rock." Gimme a break.
That's just annoying and quite a stretch of the imagination. Food can be enjoyed alongside music but that doesn't mean it has to replace it. Some people are a little too eager to come up with irritating, trendy cultural fads. Every time Schaefer repeats "is FOOD the new ROCK?" I throw up in my mouth a little. Everyone likes food, stop trying to turn it into something it's not.
Hamilton Nolan is my kinda hater - he made some great points.

team HamNo here. the fetishism over food as entertainment is ridiculous, and is but one reason americans are screwed, health-wise. chefs are not rockstars, but more often than not, tools of the corporate stronghold on any creativity cuisine could espouse. as for whether it's "the new rock," for many of us, an over-subscribed foodstand fest in prospect park is not the way many of us want to "discover" food--it was more akin to pigs fighting over the troughs at a factory farm. it was simply an overblown excuse for private enterprise to take over and "monetize" a public space which is better left to more healthy enjoyment.

What a ridiculous discussion. Although look at the difference between the audience at Woodstock, wild, free, and in physically beautiful shape, and today's festival crowds...pudgy, materialistic and their faces in an iPhone even as musicians are playing right in front of them. That's all we need, like a hole in the head....food to take the place of music.

If food really is where the conversation is, doesn't that mean that music no longer has the cultural currency it once had?

Food and Music go hand in hand. No need to make them competitive. Look at some very successful examples of "sympatico." - B.B. Kings on 42nd street...I've got very fond memories of suckin' down a plate of ribs or fried catfish while James Brown was sweatin' and gruntin' on the stage 4 feet away from me. Heck, I probably got some of that cold sweat on my ribs! The Madison Park BBQ festival...last year's Guitar Shorty show (IN THE RAIN) was even better while smelling the BBQ fumes in the air!

Food and music, hmmmm isn't America fat enough?

<yummy yummy yummy i got love in my tummy>