Got Mozart?

Lately, I have been reading a book called, "Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain" by Oliver Sacks, to pass the time as my husband is studying late into the night for exams. Last night, I read this... (Bare with me...this is a long quote)

"When Mark Twain was writing in the 1870s, there was plenty of music to be had, but it was not ubiquitous. One had to seek out other people to hear and participate in singing--at church, family gatherings, parties. To hear instrumental music, unless one had a piano or other instrument at home, one would have to go to church or to a concert. With recording and broadcasting films, all this changed radically. Suddenly music was everywhere for the asking, and this has increased by orders of magnitude in the last couple of decades, so that we are now enveloped by a ceaseless musical bombardment whether we like it or not.

Half of us are plugged into iPods, immersed in daylong concerts of our own choosing, virtually oblivious to the environment--and for those who are not plugged in, there is nonstop music, unavoidable and often of deafening intensity, in restaurants, bars, shops, and gyms. This barrage of music puts certain strain on our exquisitely sensitive auditory systems, which cannot be overloaded without dire consequences. One such consequence is the ever increasing prevalence of serious hearing loss, even among young people, and particularly among musicians." (Musicophilia 52-53)

Anyway...this has made me reflect upon a lot of things. The other day, my husband and I were in the car listening to a hip hop song on the radio. (I love listening to all sorts of music!) After dancing and singing along with it in the car, I talked to him about how funny it would be if as an old lady, I were to randomly sing this song because of a memory I had. I have seen lots of old people do this in nursing homes. They have a memory of a song, and randomly sing it...not knowing where it came from. Then I started to think about how different our music has become since my grandparents music. I actually started to feel sad that as an old lady I could randomly sing, "Replay" by Sean Kingston rather than, "Embraceable You". The old music my grandparents used to listen to is classy and meaningful. I don't feel the same way about Sean Kingston's music.

I also remember reading a book about a year ago about how classical music is really struggling to survive. So many of my friends in high school told me they hated classical music and I thought I was crazy for loving it. The book I read a year ago, (I don't remember the title because I just skimmed it for a paper I had to write on the importance of music...but I want to really read it now!) said that one of the reasons we as a society are having such a hard time filling up youth orchestras is because of the lack of interest in classical music. Our school systems don't really promote classical music anymore. I've been to too many music programs for school where all that was sung or played was movie tunes and broadways biggest hits. Where's the Mozart and Debussy these days? And how come few schools teach their students Music Theory and Aural skills? I certainly never learned it until college!

As for hearing loss...I learned in my Vocal Pedagogy class last year that a lot of youth are losing their hearing because of iPods and deafening concerts. What people don't realize is that our ears have little hairs in them that pick up overtones and pitches. When loud music is played, sometimes it damages those little hairs in our ears and they can NEVER grow back! Some musicians that listen to loud music can't even hear some high pitches anymore. My husband is one of those people that has lost a little bit of hearing due to loud concerts and shooting thunderous guns! He can't pass a basic hearing test! If we keep up the noise, there is going to be a huge nursing home full of deaf people that randomly sing trashy music. All I can say is...We need more of the soft, old stuff rather than the hard, strident, new stuff! Why can't American Idol sing some classical songs for once?