Klarinet Archive - Posting 000079.txt from 2002/04

From: Tony@-----.uk (Tony Pay)
Subj: Re: [kl] Shocking
Date: Tue, 2 Apr 2002 17:10:58 -0500

On Tue, 02 Apr 2002 16:16:37 -0500, bhausmann1@-----.net said:

> At 03:23 PM 4/2/2002 +0000, Tony Pay wrote:

> > But I already said what I wanted to say, and I think you almost
> > agreed with me: people are *taught*, or teach themselves, to be
> > arbitrarily offended by these particular words. ('Poo' doesn't
> > bother anyone, for example). Believing that using the words is
> > 'bad', and that people who use them are 'bad' people, is just part
> > of a silly system.
>
> You are missing my point. The words themselves are not bad, it is the
> context that is significant. Certain words that are perfectly
> acceptable in a roomful of your drinking buddies may be completely out
> of place in a roomful of nuns. It is simply good manners to temper
> one's discourse to the safe side when the audience is broad and of
> uncertain makeup. To do otherwise reflects badly upon the speaker.

No, actually I understand your point very well.

This is not a roomful of nuns. This is a collection of people who are
here because they want to know something about the clarinet, and, I
suggest more importantly, something of the way in which it may be used
in music.

And something about music itself.

One of the striking characteristics of music is the way that it attempts
to integrate, and sometimes succeeds in integrating, disparate elements.
Music is about both hope and despair, about heaven and hell, about anger
and reconciliation, about crudity and delicacy, and about wholeness and
separateness. And it's often like that even in the very simplest of
pieces. Why else are we moved by a simple folk-song, sung with depth?

As Michael Tippett wrote, "I would know my shadow and my light, so shall
I at last be whole."

What that means is that we have to bring all of ourselves to music when
we play, and that what is 'appropriate' can never be determined by mere
superficial conformity. Indeed, sometimes what's required looks very
much like *inappropriateness* to begin with.

So I'm not interested in pussyfooting around, and demanding nothing of
my students, or demanding nothing of my audiences. And equally, I'm not
interested in 'not offending' people here, either. If you're not up to
hearing the word 'shit', then you wouldn't have been a pal of Mozart's,
that's for sure.

Can you put up with that?

In my view, to let the wussiness that's just been surfacing here pass
without resistance is to insult you all. You're worth more than that.

And if you aren't, then you should probably unsubscribe anyway.

Tony
--
_________ Tony Pay
|ony:-) 79 Southmoor Rd Tony@-----.uk
| |ay Oxford OX2 6RE http://classicalplus.gmn.com/artists
tel/fax 01865 553339

... Violence is a lousy substitute for drugs and sex

---------------------------------------------------------------------