Steve Schwartz wrote:

>...  However, there are people - in the United States, at any rate
>- who believe for some reason that their taste and that of people who agree
>with them points to something universally true about art.  In other words,
>their likes and dislikes are natural, true, and eternal, while my likes or
>those of someone who may disagree with the canon thus created indicate an
>inability to understand True Art or a weird mis-wiring of the brain.

Which, of course, is a trait not confined to to the subject of classical
music, nor Art, nor just to the United States.

One of my favorite quotes of late (especially when applied to the artistic,
musical and political mess that is the US), is one that's been attributed
to Vaclav Havel:

   "Keep the company of those who seek the Truth; and run away from
   those who have found It".

Bill H.