I'm writing an article for a new zine for the Music Gallery
(http://www.musicgallery.org) which explores responses to the question
New Music, Why Bother?  and thought it might be interesting to get the
list's perspective.

The term 'new music' itself gets bandied about a lot, and is recklessly
applied to a lot of different things, including contemporary classical
music, experimental music, electronic music academic, popular or otherwise,
and pop music that may or may not cross over with any of the above.

The idea is to include quotes from you, the public, so if you don't want
your name included, just say so and I'll keep it anonymous.

So how about it?  Is there anything necessary or valuable about the new?
Is there a need to constantly reinvent music, or is recycling and/or
recombination (as often seems to happen in all the above-mentioned genres)
enough?  Is a repertoire of great classics somehow eternal and universal,
or do we need music from our time as well.  I realize that 'new music'
may be something that list members are not interested in, but if that's
the case, tell me why not.  Explain why classical music (or any other
kind of music) fills your needs.

Thanks and best wishes,

Scott Wilson