I got a copy of the November issue of American String Teacher today, which has an article about Janos Starker. It made me think a bit more about this music-cum-cheesecake thing. So far the conventional wisdom about the Eroica Trio (for example) is that 1) they make good music AND 2) they are babes. From the article: "In the New Age where re-interpretation has occasionally supplanted re-creation, in which arts marketing Hollywood-style and MTV aesthetics are becoming mainstream, Starker applies an antidote. He uses what he calls his musical Holy Trinity: purity, balance, and simplicity. Art is worthy of more humility and dignity and less self-promotion, he has said." Most who love the music would agree with Starker here, I think. A couple of questions do come to mind, however. First: Do people (generally I mean men here, but not exclusively!) who buy a CD because of the sexy cover art end up getting the pure benefits of the artistic performance--or is that experience inevitably "polluted" by fantasies of babes doing their thing? (If she plays like that, I wonder what she'd be like in bed) Second: What is the relation of the artist to the art, in cases where the art has to be re-created, as in music? Certainly the artist has to contribute to the experience--collaboration between composer and performer is axiomatic when the two aren't the same. This is another thread, however. I would offer apropos to this thread that the collaboration has to be judged in musical terms and not in terms of physical attributes. People should hear the music first and then look at the performers. That's really the only way you can separate the experience of the music from the appearance of the people doing it. Chris Bonds