Well, maybe I risk to out myself as a barbarian with this post, but may
that be...

Yesterday evening my lover invited me to a massage session (and she is
pretty good at it, you know).  She used oil and blankets and her pretty
hands and music.  The music was Beethoven - but Beethoven as Meditation
Music.  Famous tunes, played on real instruments (not on a synthie), played
very very smoothly and absolutely un-Harnoncourt-ly, probably edited (I
did'nt check it) and mixed with ocean waves rolling, sea gulls shrieking
and larks singing.  Horrible? Disgusting? Well, to my surprise I could very
well stand the thing, no, much more: I enjoyed the music, it opened and
softened my heart and soul and was perfectly suited to the occasion.  It
was tremendously relaxing and even moving.

But today my intellectual and puritan mind tortures me with feelings
of guilt ;-): is it right to use classical music as a kind of musical
tranquilizer? Is something wrong with me that I acutally LIKED this
Beethoven for the teethless? Or is this approach altogether wrong and it
was good music arranged well for a special occasion? Is Meditation and New
Age Music a product of heaven or of hell? Anyone out there to help my
worried brains? (By the way, the massage was fantastic.)

Robert Peters
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