Stirling Newberry <[log in to unmask]> writes a post in defense of
democracy, or at the very least requests we suspend our criticism of it, on
"this day of days' (my quote, not his).  Well, democracy sucks.  Plato, who
rarely got things right, certainly identified the problems attendant to a
democracy, the worst form of government, second only to tyranny (of which
democracy is a subspecies) -- the tyranny of the people.

Bill Pirkle opines, quite rightly,:

>Democracy tends to reduce everything to the mindset of the average, called
>normal (statistically true), and everybody else as gay, elitest, snobish,
>nerdy, bookwormish, etc.  Usually, when I improvise at the piano in the
>style of Chopin, say at a party, the women gather around.  Then when I join
>the men for a drink, I can feel the distance they place between me a them.
>Their topic is always sports, a real man's interest.

Most great composers did not compose their masterpieces in the vacuums of
a democracy, but in the aristocratic of the State.  (We can quibble about
an "aristocratic State," but most of the music written outside of one is
usually banal, trite, self-serving, and hardly meritocratic.  Our love
for "democracy" has allowed all sorts of self-serving, solipsistic, and
nonsensical ideas and banal trivialities that appeal to the lowest-common
denominator.  The whole logic of redistribution of wealth ratifies Plato's
worst expectations as a tangible reality.  Take from the 30% with money and
distribute to the 70% less wealthy, and the thievery is still guaranteed by
the popular vote -- even if the populists don't vote.

Under the medieval system of music and the later patronage system of the
Enlightenment, the "best that was every thought or done" was accomplished
for "us", even if we didn't know a thing about what was done for our
benefit.  With the apotheosis of democracy, all values are relativistic
to the individuals who hold them.  Excellence is eschewed, the more
individualistic and vulgar is esteemed.  Democracy sounds like a great
idea, especially every July 4th, but in reality, it's ultimately an appeal
to the lowest common denominator, so that no one, even the refusnick, is
not left out.  And so, has our musical state of affairs improved or
devolved?

The answer lies on the continuum of pablum.

Stephen Heersink
San Francisco
[log in to unmask]