Don Satz wrote:

>This issue has come up on the list before, and my opinion remains the same.
>It's natural for persons of a nation to have pride in their country and
>its citizens.  ...

I think there may be another aspect than pride to this.  It is natural
that each nation's music lovers have tastes formed in part by their
national culrural experience and identity.  Performers from a given country
might very well reflect those tastes to one degree or another.  If I were
American and favoured performances that reflected the tastes that I had
acquired from within the American musical culture, I would probably be
inclined to be more enthusiastic about those performances, all other things
being equal.  The same would surely go for British critics and even, gasp!,
Canadians like me.

Richard