WOULD I HAVE STOPPED?

For the day you walk past such a stunt, my friend, is the day your shit begins to stink that a lifetime of odor control won’t fix.

Heaven forbid getting caught on camera …

We salute the genius who can think up such a hooky concept for the highly-educated middle class. But let’s not forget the other appealing things about this fugly-ass pile of prose about “beauty”. Length, for one. Nothing says serious like a painfully long piece, especially when strewn with gross thesaurus-words. Upwardly mobile Americans are like deer in its headlights–it never fails. Then there’s all the proles not giving a shit, and that too at a public transit stop. This must make a class-anxious prestige-hungry member of the Ira Glass crowd giddy with joy. (And in place of “giddy with joy”, one may substitute “gasp with dismay”–the buzz of superiority takes so many forms.)

God, what’s happening?

It begins to seem that desis are merely immigrants, nothing but proles. Or why would their children show all the classic signs of the newly-middle class?

Thanks to this post, I caught another gem, obviously from deep down in the “reflection, epiphany, and self-congratulatory conclusion” section of the piece:

Let’s say Kant is right. Let’s accept that we can’t look at what happened on January 12 and make any judgment whatever about people’s sophistication or their ability to appreciate beauty.

“Kant” … “let’s say we can’t judge” …

This is a fucking masterpiece of vulgarity.

Lata–look, we are talking here about prohibitively expensive all-European music, a clear class marker and completely disconnected from the massive mainstream of America (which, needless to say, is African in every gene). Lata was never anything like that. Only if you thought that there was a culture out there, somewhere in–where else!–Europe, where Bach was popular, unremarkable, regular diet, would you imagine comparing these two “foreign” sources of “musical beauty”. Lata is beautiful, but Indians aren’t white; it wouldn’t enter our heads to talk about her voice as “universally” beautiful, “transcending” all cultural learning. We have our own messed up ways of unstinking our shit. But dissonant, hell no. For one, she has an untold number of songs plumb bang in the major scale, even pentatonic. Besides, I have seen how audiences of a thoroughgoing meat-and-potatoes “blues” mindset react to Indian scales–they shut up and listen. They feel like listening, without being forced into an expensive cramped seat and browbeaten into “reverence” by snooty symphony-center androids.

Up next: people blindsided on camera with SPELLINGS. Will orthography transcend, and what has Kant said about it? Panicked NPR listeners vote in a Pulitzer.

Separately, I wonder if the experiment would’ve had a better outcome if he’d sung popular music. Or maybe that would’ve been too easy!

I also wonder if the kid thing is a red herring, given that children are interested in and distracted by sooo many things!

All this doesn’t, of course, detract from the wonderful writing.

I can listen to Beethoven piano sonatas from over 100 years ago and still be moved to tears; not many other genres can claim that.

Different strokes for different folks, skp. Although my classical equivalent would be Dvorak, I could also say the same of a qawwali by NFAK. Others might choose different genres in the arts. I don’t think it means that classical music is necessarily more worthy of our attention and encouragement than other dwindling arts or practises, as bess pointed out.

And since you asked, I would have stopped. When I see artists on the street or subway, I feel it’s a shame not to congratulate their talent. And as a small thank you for making my day just a little brighter. The other day I heard a lovely saxophone version of the Beatles’ Yesterday, one of my favourite songs – I passed up three trains (and some money, of course) to stay and listen – completely worth it.

Yeow! I was going for transcendent not transvestite.

Seen it? Oh yeah.

Thanks, Abhi, for the throwback to the archives – that happened before I discovered your brilliance. And I must admit that when I first saw the photo I thought it was a post about some Aamir Khan epic. He’d get passed around too.

One more thing: Have you seen Shawshank Redemption? There is a scene that is one of the most poignant,sublime moments in the film, it’s when Tim Robbins character sets up the record player in the window overlooking the prison yard and plays the Letter Duet from Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro. It somehow explains the music’s significance and affect.

Seen it? Oh yeah.

One more thing: Have you seen Shawshank Redemption? There is a scene that is one of the most poignant,sublime moments in the film, it’s when Tim Robbins character sets up the record player in the window overlooking the prison yard and plays the Letter Duet from Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro. It somehow explains the music’s significance and affect.

Ah, classical music is great, but this is the prison experience that will forever stay with me.

Those who want to read it can get there, I think.

Here are Dave Barry thoughts:

[http://blogs.herald.com/dave_barrys_blog/2008/04/gene-weingarten.html Link]

Thought you might enjoy.