The composer said it was “a disgrace and a shock” that many modern school children have never heard of the likes of Mozart or Beethoven, blaming their lack of knowledge on the government continually treating classical music at an “elitist fringe activity”. He also claimed that the nation is in “grave danger of losing – through not learning or experiencing – centuries of a wealth of wisdom and works.” Maxwell Davies drew comparisons with Shakespeare and Dickens, who he also believes to have fallen out of the curriculum, saying that “It just shows what has gone wrong with areas of the educational system.” He also pointed to the new age of online information as an additional challenge to education: “If the same information is available to everyone, the challenge is who can use it the most creatively? That’s why classical music is probably more relevant in today’s society than it is has ever been – it hones people’s creativity, not just as musicians.”