John Smyth:

>It has been necessary to move on.  Maybe modern music will slowly lend
>itself to new associations, though as I write this I wonder: If earlier
>music was borne out of the rhythms of body movement and speech patterns
>and inflextion, can Modern music, which eschews everything inherently
>"human," (no scarcasm here), ever be associative? If one wants it to be?

As ever, I can point to modern composers who want to communicate, who have
created such associations, who want to and have added to human experience.
I don't reject John's "eschews everything inherently 'human'" as sarcastic,
but as inaccurate.  It's a stereotype based on a tiny sliver of modern and
contemporary music.  It paints with way too broad a brush.  It's what one
used to hear about Picasso.  What such people made of "Guernica" I have no
idea.

Steve Schwartz