mazzrick

Ok,

First of all, we're dealing with matters of subjectivity here. We can go into the whole beauty is in the eye of beholder and so on but there's no need. If someone holds an opinion about a recording or performance, they have every right to think that, no matter who they are. And crack pipes have nothing to do with it. Anyone with an ear (trumpeter, musician, or tone-deaf-stockbroker) has a valid opinion because it is theirs. If you don't obey your instincts and opinions, you have no business being in a subjective field. This is what makes music different from engineering and mathematics.

I'm sure we've all had lessons or talks with someone who we respect where we have differing opinions about something or where we think that what they're telling us is dead wrong. (i.e. Pierre Boulez has the greatest ears in the world, but he can't tune a major chord properly because he hears in equal-tempered pitch not well-tempered pitch) If you don't trust your own instinct, you become a replica and a mechanical device and loose all intrinsic value all together. I think this goes into how you end up teaching yourself. If everyone listened to their teachers for everything, we'd all sound and play the same and then life would really suck.

Shouldn't we all be thinking more critically of everyone's playing, especially our own. Instead of saying, "man that Phil Smith sure can play," you could say both one thing you liked and one thing you didn't like about his Haydn recording and we could actually discuss something and gain something. I bet he would have at least one comment for his playing at all points in time. That's probably how he got to the level he's at.

I'm sick of this, "you don't have a job, you can't have an opinion" crap. If you hear a piece of musc, you're a valid f-ing New York Times critic in my book. If you liked this recording, why? and you can't say cause it's Phil. I'm not saying you can't like it but you can't say we have to.

Matt