Chris Bonds wrote: >... the suspicion lingers that all too many mediocre musicians look to HIP >as a sort of salvation, something to distract them from doing the work of >getting good. Only with those who don't frequent early music concerts in the last few years. I spent 8 years in a symphony chorus environment, explored early music sounds for another 12 years (while still enjoying the symphony sounds) and went back to the chorus for a year of 9 performance weeks, loving every bit of it while still loving the early music sounds. But in chamber music concerts, I have heard very good modern musicians with good reps play baroque and even Beethoven music severely out of tune. Since I think good-tuning a basic prerequisite of "getting good" ... the quality depends on the individuals, and generalizations of the type you make might have held some substance in the 60s but no longer. >Somewhere along the line it's what the music has to say that matters, and >HIP is only worthwhile to the extent it makes the music happen. ANY style of attempted music making is only worthwhile to the extent it succeeds... - A http://www.andrys.com/books.html Search Classical CDs, Sheet Music, Videos