Plan B Forum

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e67T_kjc64A

OK it's Jerry Garcia, Bob Weir and Vince Welnick - Welnick was not a founding member and was only with them for a few years - and it's a bit barber shoppy, but it is the Dead and it is the Fourth.

Happy Fourth everyone!

Never figured you for a Deadhead, XKA.

Happy Fourth,

I am shamed to say I am a music snob. A never possessed a Grateful Dead album until after Garcia was dead, I head about his local Delaware folk/country connection and about the drummer who was on staff at the Smithsonian Institution.

My musical taste has become more eclectic in my old age.

snailgate

I think most of us are music snobs in one way or another, and we also have those groups that surprisingly resonate with us for no real discernible reason. Two that have done that for me are Creedence and Abba (how's that for a completely mismatched pair?); neither fits in with the styles of music I usually enjoy, but they're still there. It might be age, but I'm just not sure; sometimes things make very little sense.

On July 4 1986 (just looked up the date) I went to a Grateful Dead and Bob Dylan concert at Rich Stadium in Buffalo NY. The supporting act was some band I'd never heard of called Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.

Re music snobbery. It's a bit like how you go on vacation to Europe and find this little cafe off the beaten tourist path where all the locals eat and boast about how great /cheap /authentic /wonderful it was. We all wanted to find that band whom no-one else liked; and particularly enjoyed the bass guitar. There's an ad doing the rounds about a 'boutique' hotel where the voice is saying something like 'Do you enjoy single source coffee over a game of chess?' and 'Do you think vinyl is much warmer than digital? I know I do.' I do hate that voice.

I am quite prepared to believe that there are souls with very refined ears who can tell the difference between digital and vinyl but most of us can't. (Besides: on most sound systems the recording is the best bit and the amps and speakers are the weakest links in the chain and are more responsible for sound quality that the recording itself.).

Age has something to do with it - there was a time in my life when I could tell the difference between (say) Veuve Cliquot non-vintage and Lanson Black Label vintage champagne. I couldn't now, I'm sure. (I had an advantage - my first real job was in a flavor research lab and I was trained to recognize various esters and terpenes by smell at very low levels, and then when I went to university my vacation job was in a wine merchant with a boss who loved wine and insisted that even the cellar guys develop their taste buds so we could talk knowledgeably to customers. We might have been employed for our ability to carry heavy boxes from the delivery truck but we were still expected to know the stuff. Good times.)

I guess we're talking about two different types of "snobbery"; I understand the point you are making--the joy in being the person who can say they recognized this great, sometimes obscure, group no one else had heard of. I have seen people like this at many concerts yelling out the names of obscure album cuts to the bad, presumably to try and get them to play the song, but sometimes just to show that they know the catalog better than the conventional fans at the concert. But the type of snobbery I am referring to is saying "I can't stand pop" or "I can't stand country/southern rock" and then, for some reason, having the music of groups like the ones I mentioned attracting me; groups I shouldn't like, but, for some reason, I do.

The concert you say in 1986 sounds like a pretty good one.

I don't know how anyone who loves music could be a snob about it; there is just too much good stuff in every genre. There's also a lot of trash in every genre, but even trash music can be fun, if not elevating. Maybe everyone just needs to lighten up a little.

You could be right. but I can't believe you don't find some music (not necessarily an entire genre, but some songs) incredibly annoying and unlistenable; I think most (if not all) of us have some songs in that category.

I find modern era country (aka “young country”) to be background noise at best. I enjoy some folk and bluegrass as well as some “ironic country” but I’d be hard pressed to find what I would call good country music (tho I fully admit I may be “no true Scotsman-ing” my way out of admitting I like any modern country.

I think that, no matter what direction our tastes in music may run, we can all agree that most if not all rap/urban/hip-hop is permitted to exist merely to prove that disco wasn't that bad after all.

-"BB"-

I am a snob about rap/hip hop. I love all other forms of black music so it’s not about that. The only rap song I can think of that I’ve ever liked is Fight the Power - I used to teach the Spike Lee joint Do the Right Thing back when I was a university writing/literature instructor and it grew on me. But I haven’t bothered really trying to listen to any other rap because most of the time I can’t discern any of the lyrics so what’s the point?

My tastes are pretty wide ranging otherwise although I admit to having a soft spot for 60s/70s/80s music more than anything that’s come out since. I got into some new artists in the 90s but have tended to listen primarily to my old favorites. I guess this makes me a fuddy duddy. Oh well!

To tell the truth, BB, I'd far rather listen to rap than disco. It's not my favorite genre, but I do find a link between rap and the 60s protest songs I loved--at least the music is about something that matters and communicates ideas and genuine emotions. There are some subsets of rap which are more intended to be comical (or even offensive), and I really don't care for them, but I appreciate music that showcases anger and frustration.

Disco was more like a pop lite; an annoying genre IMHO. If you liked the beat and the musical format, then I guess you could be a fan; otherwise you would generally detest it (as I do). There are some disco songs I find less annoying than others, but for the most part I find it a waste of time. IMHO, if the music is relatively complex and varied, repeated listening might help you learn to appreciate it (such was the case with a lot of modern jazz and 20th century "classical" music for me) , but for simple, repetitive music like disco, this does not happen. It's something you either like or you don't.

"Classical" music has its own fashions and dead-ends .When was the last you listened to 20+ minutes of 'prepared piano? That was where stuff was drapped across the piano wires: chains, little bells, empty glass containers, you name it) and the strings themselves were hit by fingers as much as the black and white keys.

snailgate

When I was in high school I took cello lessons from a female music teacher who introduced me to Bach’s Unaccompanied Cello Suites the Yo Yo Ma recording and I was blown away; years later in college working at the Maine Center for the Arts and Yo Yo Ma comes as our featured season opening performer and I’m so excited and pay a small fortune for up close seats for me and my mom and then the moment the music starts I’m massively crushed because it’s some modern dystonal nightmarish cacophony that ends up giving me a headache and heartache. I’m SO not a fan of that kind of classical music. *sigh* Nevertheless I did see Yo Yo Ma in person once, and met him backstage, and he is a lovely man who plays a mean cello even if the music requires him to make it sound like a cat having sex.

I kind of recall things like that; but novelty songs/compositions are in a class by themselves. I was thinking ofmore early 20th century (and later) compositions, from Schoenberg to Phillip Glass. It took me a while to appreciate them; but I don't think I'll ever get the same felling about a concerto on a toy piano or a composition played by car horns (regular one, not the musical replacement ones).

BSG--there are some pieces I feel the same way about; the choral ones are pretty hard to sing as well.

My dream concert: Wanda Landowska on harpsichord and Pablo Casals on cello. I don't think it ever happened.

snailgate

I am a lover of the harpsichord, and she was one of the best musicians with it (I don't know if there is a rod for a harpsichord player; harpsichordist?). I think I have a recording of the Goldberg variations where she was featured, but I am sure there are other recordings of her playing in my collection. She and Casals would make an intriguing duet.

I would definitely pay big to see zombie cellist and zombie harpsichordist!

I love modern "classical" music (much of which has taken a decidedly more traditional lyrical turn in the 21st Century, but that's another story). My feeling is that music of this type--whether Bach or Beethoven or Brahms or Berg or Bartok or Berio--should take you on an aural journey presenting interesting ideas and compelling soundscapes to examine and explore. I love the Bach Cello Suites and I love the Xenakis string quartets; I love the Dvorak and the Higdon violin concertos. I grew up on Scarlatti and Schoenberg and Corelli and Carter. To me, their compositions are all of a piece, created to intrigue and delight the ear. My brother was telling me he went to see Philip Glass's Akhnaten at the Met last month and it was gorgeous, I am so jealous. There are so many things to hear and so many ways to hear them, and they are all so beautiful. I feel truly blessed to live in a time where we have the technology to readily access so much music of so many varieties from so many corners of the globe; every day can be a musical feast.

My brother was telling me he went to see Philip Glass's Akhnaten

If you get a chance to see it (I think it's pretty available on public TV)v, let me know what you think. I saw it in May and had a mixed reaction--surprisingly I enjoyed the score (I am pretty hot and cold on Glass), but had problems with the production (especially the lack of subtitles during much of it, even though the singing was not in English). There were some high points IMHO, but it dragged in others and the action was a bit hard to follow.

I do agree that there are so many varieties of music available, but I do not agree that all were written to delight the ear; indeed, I think many were written to elicit other responses, from elation to despair. I think number of the Schoenberg compositions echo this despair (which mimics the depression into which he sank for much of his life) and that is fine with me. I think a lot of music, even pieces I don't care for, is worth listening to at least once, and a big catalog permits us to listen to what we prefer or delve into understanding music we do not, at out choice. And many people may well like music I do not.

A good example I learned this in was Vaughn Williams 5 Mystical Songs; I spent a very long time learning the solo part (even though it is not really that difficult, it is, for me at least, not easy to follow) and I found only one part (the Call) that I enjoyed singing (it is part of my audition repertoire), but I had many people come to me afterwards and tell me how they enjoyed the concert. I do like some Vaughn Williams pieces (Songs of Travel was one of the earlier pieces I recall working on in voice classes), but I don't know why this one eludes me (on the other hand, I will admit I learned a lot by performing it). So I am usually up for trying anything new.