Don Satz, whom I realize may not be completely serious, nevertheless gets
my blood up:

>The 20th century contributions of British composers may well outweigh
>the contributions from the American side; that's nothing unexpected either.
>The U.S. has been a great source of 'contribution' to many areas of life,
>but art music is not one of our strengths or priorities.

Oy!  First, I don't know how one does the weighing.  Nevertheless, whenever
I hear how weak is American music, I always want to know what American
music the person has heard.  At this time, I think American music one of
the most interesting and strong in the Western world.  I don't know a
better composer now practicing than John Adams or Steve Reich.  As far as
the century goes, the following have nothing to apologize for or be humble
about:

Ives, Griffes, Copland, Thomson, Piston, Sessions, Crumb, Diamond,
Blitzstein, Gershwin, Barber, Lees, Dello Joio, Gould, Cowell, Mennin,
Persichetti, Bernstein, Antheil, Foss, Kernis, Hovhaness, Palmer, Harris,
Hanson, Herrmann, Hoiby, Seeger, Ruggles, Fine, Talma, Shapero, Babbitt,
Bergsma, Russell, Clayton, Rouse, Daugherty, Schuman, and the beat goes on.

This doesn't include the great pop songwriters - I can't think of one
first-rate British songwriter, for example, other than Ray Noble, before
the Beatles - or jazz people.

Steve Schwartz