OFF:[Carnegie Hall]

[M Holmes]

A friend of mine wrote this. I'd like to share it because it sums up a
lot of what I feel about the current conflict and the less than ironic
place music has found in no-man's land.

FoFP


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> Date: Sun, 30 Sep 2001 19:11:59 -0700 (PDT)
> From: Robert Ashcroft

> Tonight there was a free concert at Carnegie Hall in memory of the
> victims of the WTC atrocity.  Yo-Yo Ma and James Levine in different
> ways captured the mood with pieces by Bach and Mozart, but the
> highlight of the evening was the Leontyne Price.  The minute she
> ventured on stage the hall exploded with a great cry of "DIVA!" and a
> standing ovation even before she started singing.  It was like a rock
> concert---old people raised their fists, and I'm sure that if they'd
> had them, they would have lit cigarette lighters in tribute.

> Accompanied by James Levine on piano, she first sang an old spiritual
> that I did not recognize, but which received rapturous applause.

> When she started in, unaccompanied, on "America the Beautiful" you
> could have heard a pin drop.  What an incredible voice.  Two verses
> and then she hit the chorus once more, and in the last line took her
> voice up a full octave above where she had been singing.
> Unbelievable.  Carnegie Hall has seen a lot, but that will go down in
> the history books.

> The only decoration in the hall was a large American flag, hanging
> sideways at the back of the stage.  I thought about how appropriate
> were the evening's selections.

> One commentator has described our this struggle as one between the
> modern and the medieval.  Western culture largely escaped the medieval
> during the Enlightenment.  The very term reflects our view of what
> preceded it, a time of superstition, fear and violence we now refer to
> as the Dark Ages.

> The U.S.  was the first country born out of the Enlightenment.  Our
> founding fathers were grounded in the Enlightenment, and our
> Constitution reflects it---even in the existence of a Constitution.
> This did not make the US a perfect state by any stretch of the
> imagination, but in the big tests, the country has ultimately hewed to
> the spirit of these principles.  We are children of the Enlightenment,
> whether we know what that means or not.

> Our culture reflects that, being tolerant to a fault.  Read what you
> want to read, think what you want to think, watch what you want to
> watch, listen to what you want to listen, live as you want to live, so
> long as you leave others alone.  We even tolerate within our midst the
> few unreconstructed wretches who never left the Dark Ages, the likes
> of Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson who would have us believe that a
> malevolent god allowed the WTC atrocity to occur because of our
> tolerance.

> The humane music of the Enlightenment, such as Bach, who wove music
> with mathematics, and Mozart, whose harmonies have never been
> surpassed, are an appropriate way to remember the WTC atrocity.  But
> in fact, so is any music at all.  We are dealing with an enemy that
> has never been enlightened, and bans all our music.  We are dealing
> with people who have never left the dark ages, and for whom all the
> Enlightenment principles that we live by are anathema.  We are dealing
> with people who are in thrall to their Jerry Falwells and Pat
> Robertsons.

> It's worth pondering why our culture is so threatening to these
> people.  Western culture is not imposed on anyone.  The US does not
> have an empire.  Our culture is marketed around the world, and the
> marketing is sophisticated.  But a McDonald's salesman is quite a
> different proposition than a Roman legion or colonial soldiers.
> Except under great worldwide pressure to do so (thinking here of
> Bosnia and Kosovo, where the US finally intervened to protect, of all
> people, Muslims), the US does not invade and hold territory.

> US culture is sold around the world, but the world "sold" is key: it
> is considered something desirable to own through free exchange.
> People willingly pay money to experience it.  And if you choose not to
> do so, that's fine too---we don't insist that you do so.  Our
> Hollywood salesmen just want to make a buck.  In fact, they go to
> great lengths to make sure that you don't get what their selling if
> you don't pay (it's called copyright).  We don't kill, rape, torture
> or otherwise impose our culture on the unwilling.  We don't want to.
> Which is almost unprecedented, when you take a look at the history of
> superpowers down the ages.

> Our culture is nevertheless considered dangerous.  And why not?
> Reflected in it is the fundamental vision that people are free to live
> as they please.  That's a seductive thought, and highly threatening to
> those with a vested interest in maintaining their people in the Dark
> Ages.

> It's ironic.  Rock has always been hyped as the music of rebellion.
> Generally, it's as processed and as corporate as any other product.
> Who would think that the hype would become the reality? We really are
> facing an enemy who, given half a chance, really would take away your
> rock and roll.  And your Mozart, and your Bach, and James Levine and
> Yo-Yo Ma, and most of all, your divas like Leontyne Price.  Well, to
> hell with the enemy.

> RNA

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