23.12.2025

Study 24/12 – A Field Experiment in Advent

by Dr. Michael Bühler

Question: What happens if, in the highest-revenue month of the year, we consistently refrain from playing classical Christmas music?

A quasi-scientific scenario with surprisingly real side effects:
No Christmas Oratorio. No Messiah. No Ave verum corpus. No Silent Night.

Observation 1: The Christmas economy collapses quietly.

Without Bach, December loses its acoustic dramaturgy. Customers suddenly move efficiently. Purposefully. Suspiciously fast. Dwell time drops – and with it, revenue.
Without Handel’s Messiah, impulse purchases disappear. No one thinks anymore: “Oh well, it’s Christmas.”

Credit cards breathe a sigh of relief – retailers do not.
In short: December grows quieter – and so does turnover.

Observation 2: The family destabilizes itself loudly

At home, it becomes apparent very quickly: classical Christmas music usually acts as an emotional buffer.
Without “Silent Night,” there is no moment of collective agreement.
Honesty sets in, unfiltered. Pauses feel no longer festive, but like technical malfunctions.
Children become conspicuously tired early. Adults conspicuously honest.
Grandparents say things that are otherwise reliably covered up by choral singing.

In short: what remains is unfiltered reality. With dessert.

Preliminary conclusion of the study:
Classical music is neither nostalgic decoration nor a luxury.
It is economic infrastructure, family crisis prevention, and social stabilization.

Perhaps we should ask less often
whether we can afford classical music –
and more often what it costs when it is missing.

We will stay with this topic
Classic Now Foundation