Hal

I don't know this album either, but I've learned to trust John's choices.

I haven't said anything about this live ... I haven't seen it in ages, I have an ancient VHS tape that might have demagnetized, I just remember that to watch this and other concert films we used to gather at a friend's house, goofing around all night. The scene with the dog singing the blues was the pinnacle.

With this, I do not mean to say that de gustibus is not important. I am convinced of the opposite. An emotional, intuitive understanding is important; even Copland acknowledged this. But it is certainly incomplete, partial. The historical framework, the technical aspects (which I cannot provide) are important, but for me, they are no less significant than other interpretative forms. It is a form of understanding that must be taken into account even when conducting a critique, then. Since the emotions induced by musical listening arise from the relationship with one’s own emotional experience, made up of knowledge, memories, and so on, and considering that each experience has a unique character, it follows that individual emotional knowledge is also unique. And this is where I find its importance lies. Indeed, I personally find reviews that do not help me answer a simple question—"Did you like it? And why?"—to be arid. Final footnote: I apologize for the length, but no one is obliged to read it.

Let's move on to other matters. What does it mean that "you can't talk seriously about music"? Analysis and classification are categories that connect with musical interpretation, which takes place at different levels (historical, technical) and represents an aspect of approaching music that exists. You can do it, but you can also choose not to do it; that's fine, but to summarize it all as "it's nonsense" is nonsense itself. To carry out this kind of interpretation, it's clearly necessary to sharpen a set of critical tools that allow, through analysis, to make choices and comparisons. People like Bernstein, who had analytical tools, could afford to identify innovative musical phenomena within the rock and pop scenes in relation to musical languages. This is a discussion that does not undermine the value of de gustibus, which nonetheless does not summarize or conclude the discourse on the understanding and value of music. It is not possible to reduce everything to de gustibus; otherwise, there would be nothing to discuss. That Bach is one of the fathers of music is a fact, and that's enough to send him into space to represent all of humanity with Voyager. Seminal (another ugly and pointless adjective that seems to be loved for some reason...) is too little for Bach, and he's just one example. People like Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven have constructed and innovated musical language; in some cases, they have brought musical forms to their greatest splendor. Their influence is not just an influence; there's construction behind each of these names (which are just examples), and those who came after benefited from their work. This is why they hold absolute value in music; they may not be pleasing to some, but these are two different aspects that, in my opinion, should not be conflated.

Ah, here we go... so I'll share my thoughts. Without beating around the bush so we understand each other right away, I think you've written an ocean of nonsense, though there might be some valid points that drown in all the bullshit. Let's start with the last one: the lack of seriousness. What does that mean? It's a choice that can be shared or not, but it's not THE choice. Your vision of the site's philosophy isn't the site's philosophy. They used to say that this place is a game, but not everyone plays the same way. For me, the site's philosophy lies, if anything, in freely bringing together different views that don't exhaust themselves in just messing around. Everyone experiences this place in their own way. Point two: to summarize, you throw a fit every time someone talks about things they don't know, sometimes going on about (pseudo) useless classifications, and yet here you dive into things you barely understand. For things far less significant than the big bullshit "Classical music lacks variety of sound," you’ve instigated processes and burned users. Ajò caz...

oh, is this the speech?

I don’t know? Can someone tell me what you’re talking about because I didn’t understand a thing from this conversation.

less nonsense would be much better damn

Yeats ... "the sigh of all the struggling heavens"

There are some mp3s on their site that is quite nice.