Professor Bernard Chasen wrote:

>Do you really believe that you can judge a piece of music the way you would
>judge gymnastics, or the dogs at a dog show? In the final analysis the work
>moves you and draws you into its world or it doesn't.  And different works
>will do it for different listeners, although there is clearly great overlap
>in the results when masters are producing the music.  By no means perfect
>overlap as discussions of Vivaldi and Beethoven on this liszt demonstrate!!

I agree.  I also wonder what is the point to this exercise.  If we accept
this checklist on good vs.  bad what are we to do with it? What if a
favourite work should come up lacking according to our list? Do we shun
it from now on? Or must we now listen to music which heretofore has set
our teeth on edge because it meets all our criteria for greatness?

More and more these days I'm hard-pressed to think of music which is truly
bad.  Often that which seems dull or routine, when put in the context of
its period or the intentions of its composer, takes on a validity which I
don't feel justified in denying.  For me there is music which grabs me and
that which doesn't.  Greatness or the lack of it seems entirely irrelevant.

Eric James
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