[Harp-L] understanding and appreciation

[Jonathan Ross <jross38@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I may have come off more strident than intended with my original  
post.  I would certainly agree that understanding a musical form can  
lead to an appreciation of a genre which hadn't existed previously,  
this doesn't inherently lead to a liking of that genre.  I took a  
course in college where I finally learned to understand opera.  It  
allowed me to appreciate the genre and in part be able to discern the  
good and the bad in the genre.  But, it didn't make me like opera any  
more than I had previously--indeed, I still don't enjoy opera (with a  
few exceptions).

What I objected to were the assumptions that a lack of understanding  
was behind a dislike of the music and that if people were not  
ignorant they would like it. I agree that with understanding you can  
learn to appreciate things you had merely instinctively disliked  
before, but that appreciation doesn't mean you are going to enjoy it  
anymore than before.  It is this blaming of the audience for not  
embracing complex musics by calling them ignorant which I find  
elitist and arrogant.


 ()()    JR "Bulldogge" Ross
()  ()   & Snuffy, too:)
`----'