Classical Music is Dead

In reading an article today on the utility of music; I followed a link on one of the comments. The person shared a first name with me.  On the page it said, "Phil is a composer of serious classical music".  Aside from the moment of disentangling my identity from my name in the first moments, my main issue with that statement is the terms used to describe the music.    The Classical era in music is over.  When most people say classical music they are referring to a broad range of "art music" from the last 400 years, but there isn't really a cohesive enough element to these in the same way as other genre.    Now from what I could see through the infuriating web design, this other Phil is stuffy, but nor is he old enough to have lived in the time of Hayden.   If he is writing in that style, he should say so. And while the shorthand might be enough for most, if you want to pigeon hole yourself but then place that into one of many, why not address the issue more broadly.   I would have loved to spend this time actually engaging in the dialogue of Art as political action and not referencing something as a choice, and therefore a reference of it; The limits of expression and all that.  But I felt that first I had to distinguish myself from this other Phil, a composer.    My assertion of identity satiated, on to other things I move.