reflexology

the pain in my knee is from a cut on my heart

I am going to set the record straight: I like classical music. A lot. My appreciation stems not from intellectual snobbery (everyone is a music snob, thinks the music they listen to is cutting edge). By and large I agree. What I would like to know is when did having a taste for dead composers make one less of a connoisseur?

The passion in a good composition escalates and engages my imagination. It is lyrical and poetic, without blessed words. The elitist mentality is a limitation. I understand that listening to Rachmaninov takes acclimation. Jazz does too. Training our ears and minds to hear the relationship between notes and melody is a practice of patience. It is resistance training. We are all brought up with notions that it is pretentious music, written for fine dining and elevators. Admitting to like classical music is akin to the first taste of flesh. At first the body is foreign and exotic, only handled (ha) in morsels. But our appetites, they do grow.

I am not arguing that everyone load their i-pods up with Handel's water music. I am suggesting that there may well be a composition that inspires and titillates you. The ears are organs which like variety. In a world of ever increasing spead and variety, the understanding of historical art is losing to the concupisent seduction of modern replicas.