Well Diki, I guess it’s just me and you that enjoy talking about music around here, or simply we’re just the last men standing, LOL.

Well, I completely agree with you about the sad state of affairs of modern popular music, but that wasn’t really my point . . But that is an interesting topic and I will add my two cents in it little bit here..

I was trying to say, if perhaps you could hear John Baptiste’s version of Fur Elise as a non-musician., you might enjoy it a little bit more.. but who knows?

As far as your assessment of popular music, I am in complete agreement. The frustrating thing is, I don’t think we’ve ever been in a period of time where we’ve had so many great young musicians.. there’s preteen kids out there that can absolutely burn on jazz standards, the classical repertoire, or any other genre for that matter. and there’s plenty of established pop artists like Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars for example, that can can really play and sing, but my feeling is they are pressured to really dumb things down and make it sound like everything else so they can sell.

I think older musicians always have and always will be critical of current musical trends. While you and I might look back with fondest of The Beatles for example, they for sure, had their fair share of criticism from the older musicians from that time period.

I remember when I was 12 years old, I was at home and heard the breaking news of John Lennon getting shot dead. My dad and his best friend, who happened to be a very accomplished jazz drummer were in the living room, listening to Clifford, Brown, and Max Roach. I burst in the living room to tell them the tragic news, and my dad‘s friends said something really awful “ it’s about time they shot that.***** , I hope they shoot the rest of that lousy band that destroyed music “

I’m not saying that you are like my dad’s friend, Diki. But as you are very well aware, anyone over 30 that is critical of youth culture, fashion and music will come across as rather cantankerous. Now get off my lawn! LOL 😂