Category: Car Thoughts

I said what I said.

The hot topic this week has been choir snobbery online in regards to pop music, or commercial music. I think this is an important topic, but as always, I have my own little angle that might be different than most. It could be that telling people what they must support can be just as elitist as not supporting things. I will call it “Preference Policing.” So, where is the line?

• Can we express our likes and dislikes just like other consumers of music?
• Or do we, as music educators need to vocally “cheerlead” all music?
• Is the tendency for vocalists to nitpick the techniques or “validity” of pop singers a sign of our corruptly elitist view of singing?

Maybe. But it could also be that we’re just jealous…

I saw a few posts from colleagues recently that seemed to lament our inability to have good discussions among people who disagree online. The first problem: we aren’t actually having discussions anymore…

The best conversations I’ve ever had with colleagues have been in the bar at conventions. Or on my show!

Just a random rant in my car. As performance opportunities dwindled over the last year, we have been quick to rationalize this as a good thing. Maybe because we needed to in order to cope with the loss? Either way, maybe it’s not that simple. Maybe the performances are critical.