Resuscitating Art Music

Resuscitating Art Music: ‘One student answered, “I like rock music because even if I’m doing something else, even if I’m in a different room, I can still get it. I can still tell where the beat is.”

Then he said something I’ve been thinking about ever since. “I like rock music because you don’t have to pay attention in order to get it.”

He really seemed to resent it that the fourteenth-century music required him to do something, to pay attention. Since that time, I have realized that, in our country, the ability to pay attention has become endangered. As a result, art forms that require the audience’s attention are endangered, too.’

Getting curmudgeonly cranky in my dotage, am I not — liking this essay quite a bit.