Klarinet Archive - Posting 000344.txt from 1994/11

From: "Dan Leeson: LEESON@-----.EDU>
Subj: Contemporary music
Date: Thu, 24 Nov 1994 13:43:38 -0500

Oh Garret in Maine, you have made me into a wrinkled, wizened, old poo by
saying that you played "one of the older works, George Washington Bridge."
Let's revisit that one for nothing but putting a balm on my ego.

Berlioz's band music is old. Mozart's wind serenades are older. Gossec's
military music is also old, maybe very old. But "George Washington
Bridge" is only old to you. To me, it was a brand new piece when I first
played it and the composer, William Schumann has been dead less than a year.

My daughter does the same thing to me when she asks, "What was life like
before television? What did you do at night? How did you get the news?
And how could you live without MTV?"

I am going to bed and if I don't get out, it is Garret's fault!!

P.S. I like what you say, but your arguments are not logical. If you say
that your prefer the band to the orchestra (as is your right and it is a
matter of taste in any case), then the reason should not be so easily
contradicted. You said that the motivation behind your preference was that
the band used a greater compliment of instruments. By that logic, the
addition of tenor saxes to the Mozart g minor symphony would produce a
better work. I think that if you reflect not on what you said, but how
you said it, you will realize that you have tried to express a personal
preference (which is OK) with a reason that can be contradicted almost
instantaneously (which is not OK because it damages your credibility).
All of my friends at the U. of Maine math department are now after you
for logical inferences based on illogical premises and you must give up
your clarinet to me forever for having done that. Send it by FEDEX
please. I can use the reeds. You pay for the shipping too.

====================================
Dan Leeson, Los Altos, California
(leeson@-----.edu)
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