Leon Le Leu writes:

>'Un bel di' on his iPOD but this is not because he is a Puccini fan; it
>is because the song has been used in a Japanese anime that he likes.
>This is one way of getting classical music into them.

Ah!  So your son's another fan of "Magnetic Rose", one of the most
haunting sci-fi anime films out there.  Good!

I'm a recent convert to anime, partly because the quality of the
soundtracks is fantastically high.  Exposure of Western Youth en masse
to Yuki Kajiura's thrilling soundtracks for "Noir" and ".Hack/Sign" -
or better still Shinkichi Mitsumune's beautifully crafted one for
"Revoltionary Girl Utena" - would give any kid a headstart in sorting
out cinematic wheat from the such chaff as Howard Shore's anodyne
dreariness for "Lord of the Rings".

And in case anyone thinks this is off topic, let me add that Japanese
kids call these anime scores "classical", mainly because they use acoustic
instruments and the odd stretch of piano/oboe duet, string quartet (ala
Nyman) or what have you.  This is their idea of classical music and they
like it.  What's more as a result Japanese teens don't have anything
like as much prejudice against what you or I might think *did* constitute
a classical score.

This suggests two things to me.  One, we should lobby to get these
Japanese composers over to Hollywood in place of the sub-sub-Waltonic
merchants ruling the current roost.  Two, let's start calling any pop
stuff we hear "classical" too, so - eventually - maybe everyone can start
talking about "music" again, without all these silly and largely meaningless
divisions.

Christopher Webber, Blackheath, London, UK
http://www.zarzuela.net
"ZARZUELA!" The Spanish Music Site