I recently mentioned my band directors not being *into* CM.  While that
is true, they both program very good music, and no pop.  Even in Marching
Band (the last four years, we've done The Firebird, Prokofiev's Ivan the
Terrible, De Meij's The Hobbit, and the Divine Comedy by a popular
contemporary band composer named Robert W.  Smith).  This comes, I think,
from the fact that we have an excellent music department, and so, not to be
wasted.  In fact, this whole year has been full of classics.  But even with
all this, there is never seems to be a real excitement in either when they
talk about a piece we are playing, they never seem to be trying to interest
students, they just want them to play better (a noble goal, but it should
not be the only one).

Patrik mentioned that what is usually called the "accessible" music is not
necessarily so.  I can force myself to enjoy (that's not a paradox) early
to middle Mozart, but still, light, fluffy music does not really appeal to
me.  Mahler, Mussorgsky, Strauss, Mendelssohn (I don't know exactly why he
fits in here, but he does), Shostakovich, late Beethoven, Vaughan Williams,
Borodin, those are the ones which get my blood flowing, whether the piece
is slow or fast, loud or soft.  I am a horn player, and I still am bored by
Mozart's concertos.  Perhaps it is because I made the jump to CM from
Classic rock, Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, Pink Floyd and the like.

Edwin Phua says:

>My own junior college band played Mussorgsky's 'Pictures at an Exhibition'
>a few years back, and many of my friends found it boring and tedious!

Did these people have pulses?!? That is one of the most exciting,
interesting, varied, and "accessible" of all the pieces I know.  I guess
some people just don't get it.

Robert Shaw asked if any band directors played some riveting piece of
music for the students, and if so, how they reacted.  My director does
play music for my band, it seems, whenever he has the piece (i have had to
supply him with quite a few).  The only time it had an effect on the entire
group, I think, was when he played the first movement of Borodin's 2nd...
or maybe that was my imagination, since I love that piece.  But I think the
whole group enjoyed that music.  I know that what got me into CM was The
Procession of The Nobles, by Rimsky-Korsakov.  After hearing that once, I
*had* to find it, and that was that.  So, I think it just depends mostly on
the students, and (although this is incredibly painful to say...  I plan to
teach music) much less on the educator.  I hope I'm proven wrong.

~John~