[HANASHIR:13617] Re: What About Musical Fairness?

[Andy Curry <acurry...>]

Eric hits the nail on the head.  As my wife is fond of saying re: Britney 
Spears etc., "She should keep every penny she makes."

I have never watched the Grammies, or the Emmies, or any other award 
show.  They are irrelevant to the art they purport to recognize.  Even last 
year's Grammy Album of the Year, "O Brother", was a recycling of musical 
substances whose originals I've been listening to for years (not to say it 
wasn't good, but why get excited about imitation?).

Kol tuv,
Andy

At 02:49 PM 2/24/2003 -0500, you wrote:
>Chevrei -
>
>I for one did *not* watch the Grammys for reasons so eloquently put by 
>Jack. As far as I'm concerned, truly musical music in the industry has 
>been absent for years. Sholom does make a good point about the 
>non-correlation between Grammy awards and what most of us would consider 
>real artists. His observation indicates that, if the Grammy's are any 
>reliable standard, don't bother looking for a reverse trend anytime soon. 
>In the entertainment industry style will forever trump substance. 
>Borrowing a line from Dennis Miller on the same topic, one day our 
>grandchildren will be sitting in a dentist's chair while on the Muzak 
>station the Ray Conniff singers are crooning "It's getting hot in here ..."
>
>We can only hope that people will get sick of Eminem and the like, and it 
>will be their careers we'll be saying kaddish for. There are many such pop 
>icons who are considered the hottest thing sinced sliced challah, and then 
>three years later kids have no clue who they are. (Anyone remember the New 
>Kids on the Block? Me neither.)
>
>- Eric
>
>P.S. While John Mayer looks like he's in high school and writes songs 
>about it, he's 25 and actually quite well-spoken. True he's no James 
>Taylor, but I personally enjoy much of his compositions.
>----- Original Message -----
>From: <mailto:jbielan (at) pacbell(dot)net>jbielan
>To: <mailto:hanashir (at) shamash(dot)org>hanashir (at) shamash(dot)org
>Sent: Monday, February 24, 2003 12:29 PM
>Subject: [HANASHIR:13612] What About Musical Fairness?
>
>As I watched the Grammy Awards last night, I often felt like someone 
>should be saying Kaddish for the music industry.
>
>I've always prided myself on trying to keep aware of contemporary musical 
>trends, and I realize that just because something isn't suited to my 
>particular tastes, it may certainly still have musical validity if it 
>rings true for others.  Whether I agree with the with the platform of 
>vulgarity on which he seems to lean, I suspect that Eminem truly does have 
>some real artistic ability.
>
>However, I just couldn't help thinking that, no matter how you slice it, 
>dice it, clothe (or mostly unclothe)
>it or promote it: mediocrity is still mediocrity.  Alongside the 
>blossoming talent of kids like Norah Jones,
>somehow - at least in my humble opinion - most of the industry is about 
>image and promotion - musical validity be damned.
>
>To my ears, I think so much of rap music is just unoriginal tripe trying 
>to pass itself off as contemporary groove music.  My God, the original 
>Temptations and Marvin Gaye must be rolling over in their graves. Add as 
>much softcore pornography as they can get away with, plus nauseatingly 
>inflated, entirely unjustified egos - and you've got at least seventy 
>percent of what's out there.
>
>And maybe it's because I worked on James Taylor's "Sweet Baby James" album 
>- but to my eyes, that 16-year-old kid John Mayer doesn't even resemble an 
>artist who's reached the kind of maturity which garners this much 
>attention. Hopefully he's got a bright future, but he looks and sounds 
>like a high school kid right now - regardless of how many records "the 
>machine" has managed to push.
>
>How striking to see James alongside cello virtuoso Yo Yo Ma - then having 
>to endure that  talentless, spazmatic-appearing fool from Coldplay (who, 
>to my ears, wouldn't know a melody or a metronome if they smacked him in 
>the face) accompanied by a renown New York orchestra.
>
>And certainly most glaring of all: awards given to musicians of every 
>category, including Native Americans and all kinds of foreign 
>ethnicities... and not one single solitary acknowledgement of Jewish 
>music.  Let's see... what's the name of the new Grammy 
>president?  Funny... "Portnow" sounds like a Jewish name to me.
>
>Hey Neil: instead of cow-towing to all the mediocre, 
>gang/pornography-oriented, young so-called "artists" who've ruined the 
>music industry - just so you can appear to be racially and politically 
>correct - how about having the guts to simply judge artists on their true 
>artistic merits?
>
>Is it only me - one of three or four white guys who used to write for 
>Jobete Music (formerly Motown Records' giant publishing subsidiary) - or 
>does it appear to anyone else that much of the recording industry is being 
>held hostage by a bunch of hoods who stuff their talentless junk down our 
>throats while holding the guns of "if you don't like us, you're a racist" 
>to our heads?
>
>You don't become a bigot because you tell Ja Rule he can't use four-letter 
>words on national television.  You don't become a Ku Klux Klan member 
>because you tell Nelly (who, by the way, offered up the single most 
>laughingly tasteless edits of two songs which I've ever heard) that his 
>"act" is obscene and not suitable for national television
>
>Relax, Neil - it's O.K. ... just as long as you recognize that true genius 
>has no color barriers.  Just ask Herbie Hancock, B.B. King, Luther 
>Vandross, Patti LaBelle, India.Arie, Joe and so many of the other true 
>artists who've brought their inestimable contributions to our musical 
>lives (virtually all of whom, behind closed doors, will share their dismay 
>over the current state of the recording industry).
>
>Call me crazy, but I just have to think that many of the gifted artists 
>who participate in this forum have made musical statements which are... at 
>the very least...  of equal validity to "It's Gettin' Hot In Here".
>
>Where's the real equality?
>
>Thank you for letting me share.
>
>

Andy Curry
7990 W 114th Terrace
Overland Park KS 66210

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