Leon Le Leu wrote:

>If I can listen to the Beethoven 7th symphony for the thousandth time
>and still be moved by it why can the same thing not be allowable with
>the pathetique symphony?  Are we Tschaikovsky-lovers going to be driven
>underground and our pleasure become a secret vice such as the old medical
>textbooks used to warn about?

It is not only Tchaikowsky, but any other composer whose work does
not live up to the present-day 'critics' concept of form.  This tends
to eliminate many whose compositions are termed 'romantic'.  I suspect
the reason is that the impact of such pieces depends much more on the
interpreter than the others.  That this makes such works 'lesser' I
flatly deny. I have heard many performances of Schubert's Great C Maj,,
but only one in which the last movement is 'Great'.  Having seen how
much critical opinion has changed in the last 60 years I am somewhat
sceptical about current judgements.>>If you are going to pick on any
musical work to suppress, could it >not >be Elgar's Enigma variations?
On the local classical channels I >estimate >it has been played a million
times; sometimes in consecutive weeks.

Hear, hear. Formally good, but totally uninspiring.

Ernie