Bert Bailey wrote:

>The chance for one to hear something new by accident is simply cut off,

Let me insert here a recent experience which while not typical is, however,
to the contrary.  On our way back to Virginia from Hawaii, a flight which
compresses the time zones and requires one flight over night (either over
the ocean or over the land) if made continuously, we decided to break the
trip up by spending the night in a Los Angeles hotel near the airport
before continuing.

It was already late in the evening, local time (although two hours
earlier by our body time) and there seemed to be nothing interesting on
the TV, which seemed to be broken anyway, so I tried the little table radio
and stumbled upon an LA classical music station, apparently operated by
USC.  There I heard, for the first time, a remarkable work for low female
voice and orchestra, some of which sounded Wagnerian to me, except that it
wasn't Wagner, and besides, it was sung in English.  I discovered that it
was Elgar's *Sea Pictures*, sung by Dame Janet Baker w/ the London Symphony
Orchestra conducted by Sir John Barbirolli.  I purchased the recording
after we got home even though it was paired w/ the Du Pre performance of
Elgar's Cello Concerto, of which I already had a recording.  I've enjoyed
listening to the *Sea Pictures* again but wish the recording had come w/
texts to the songs.

Walter Meyer