> There is nothing about classical music that is in and of itself
> difficult/forbidding.
True, but I think their problem (and that of a lot of other young people these days) is that it does not have that unremitting (drum machine) beat and constant fortissimo that they seem to demand in their music. It speeds up, slows down, gets loud and soft, and has so many instrumental colors -- not just that constant electric guitar, bass, and drums that's so comforting, apparently. Very confusing!
> If you genuinely love it, so will your kids. When they are teenagers
> they will reject it and they will reject everything you listen too as
> uncool, almost no matter what it is. The only two things my son and I
> agreed about during his adolescence were Hendrix and Marley. When your
> kids are teenagers, your job is to be uncool. Then, they can be cool.
> That's the right way to play that game.
Well, there seems to be a pattern that is followed by many young rock fans -- when they become middle-aged, they begin to want to listen to something else a little more complex. In my case, my mother was a classical music fan and a pianist (my father was completely indifferent to all kinds of music), so she got me started with piano lessons and listening to her records (78s in those days, of course). Then I started on the trumpet and moved down the brass family to trombone. After that, I got started on classical guitar, which I still hack away at (just like my hero :-), Kerry). So I never did get very interested in pop music -- not enough substance in it to interest me.
My experience is that someone who performs music, even on an amateur level, has a completely different understanding of it than someone who only listens. My older boy did eventually take up acoustic guitar and did a bit of a singer-songwriter thing, which is temporarily on the shelf, but which I hope he will get back to.
Jon Johanning // jjohanning at igc.org __________________________________ A gentleman haranguing on the perfection of our law, and that it was equally open to the poor and the rich, was answered by another, 'So is the London Tavern.' -- "Tom Paine's Jests..." (1794); also attr. to John Horne Tooke (1736-1812) by Hazlitt