slg@ukma.UUCP (Sean Gilley) (11/18/85)
To some extent it makes sense that you have to work at
listening to music for the music to be considered ``good'' music.
In the same way it also makes sense to say ``Why listen to some-
thing repeatedly if you don't get something new out of it each
time?'' But this doesn't have to be true all the time.
Even in the area of popular music these statements can be
considered true. I'm not up on current popular music (I don't
happen to enjoy most of it), but if we take a song like _Suite
Judy Blue Eyes_ by CSN I'd have to say I find new meanings and
emotions, well maybe not every time I listen to it, but many
times.
On the other hand, I can listen to _Find the Cost of Free-
dom_, perhaps not as often, but just as enjoyably, and not find a
single new feeling or meaning. It's a simple plea.
I must admit, there are pieces of music that I did not like
at first hearing, that I had to `work' to understand, that now I
think of as some of my favorite music. Bartok, Stravinski both
are in that list. So is the Webber musical _Evita_. But the mu-
sical _Sweeny Todd_ is not. Nor are Beethovan's symphonies. Nor
are many songs. Do I consider them less because I liked them im-
mediatly? No.
My test of music is how long I like a piece. Do I like it
for a week, a year, or do I still enjoy it after several years?
And just because I don't like it, that doesn't mean someone else
won't think it's the greatest piece of music ever written.
(*That*, of course is _Suite Judy Blue Eyes_. :-)
Sean.
--
Sean L. Gilley Phone: (606) 272-9620 or (606) 257-4613
{ihnp4,decvax,ucbvax}!cbosgd!ukma{!ukgs}!slg, slg@UKMA.BITNET
Watches are a conspiracy by Swiss confidence men.