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Really music lost its fun?

Why music is not important anymore.

By Giovanni ProfetaPublished 2 years ago 7 min read
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Yesterday, while recovering from a mild flu, I had the chance to put on my headphones and watch some music videos from my youth just for the sake of it! I went from Classic rock to glam rock in the blink of an eye, Def Leppard, Cinderella, Ratt, Poison, Skid Row and many more began to thrive on my playlist. I was just 13-years-old when “Smell like teen spirit” changed the scene. Why I was not into Nirvana is not important right now. I considered myself a connoisseur while in my teens. I bought Hysteria by Def Leppard when it first came out back in 1987, I bought “Appetite for destruction” on vinyl the same year. I took music and music taste very seriously; it was my way to categorize the people around me.

Among my family, there was people into Italian folk songs, Italian 60’s music and lavish instrumentals. Another group was into modern artists like Depeche Mode, Alphaville, Madonna and others under that vein. The Latin-infused group enjoyed Salsa and Merengue (Yes, I know almost every song from those 80’s hits that became the soundtrack of every family reunion. I am even thinking about playing one song from Juan Luis Guerra on my digital piano, is that good). A group was not into any particular kind of music but was incredible malleable to go with anything that was capable to change your mood and make you move.

And in the middle of everything was I. Someone who enjoyed 80s music while all my friends were into Nirvana and the grunge movement that came with it. Like I said, I used music to categorize people, to insert them into this rhythmic boxes and store them at will. Sure, sometimes my method had its faults, I was even difficult to put myself into a single box. I was a teenager who loved Kiss and Ozzy Osbourne and at the same time sat and listen to some Vivaldi or Bach in the solitude of my room with only my Sony Discman as partner in crime.

A kid and his Discman

Classical music was considered by me as my guilty pleasure, something that moved me deeply but forbidden, an acquired taste if you know what I mean. One time I even had to lie to a record store clerk when she asked me if I needed a gift bag for the Beethoven’s 3rd symphony I was paying. It was not normal for a teen to be record shopping for classical, and to tell you the truth, not even 70’s rock, a teen does not belong to that shelve.

Laser Disc

Yesterday’s music exploration took me to Yanni and his groundbreaking “Live at the Acropolis” I found plenty of videos of that concert. Back in the day, Laser disc was the highest video quality available, a humongous shiny disc the size of a vinyl but with the quality and looks of a cd. It was the holy grail of sound and image, “Yanni Live at the Acropolis” was the first Laser Disc that I had the chance to see on that format. I still remember the clarity, definition and sharpness. I was like being there with this mysterious dark-haired man all dressed in white playing at the skirts of this suggestive location. It was sonic bliss to my ears, what an experience it was.

I bought the cd and make a cassette copy to play it on my dad’s car almost every day for maybe 2 months. I played it ad nauseam with a mix of naiveté and awe. The location and music was so evocative that I could put my headphones on and as soon as the first note of Santorini began to play, I was magically transported to the Herodes Atticus Theater in Athens, right there, in the middle of the orchestra, watching music unfold in front of my very own eyes.

Yanni Live at the Acropolis

One song in particular caught my attention while watching the laser disc back in the day, “One man’s dream.” Me being a young and easily impressed kid as I was, I had this thought of what if playing this tune was Yanni’s dream? I was truly mesmerized by the look on his face while performing, a face of satisfaction and gratitude, being capable of living your dream must be something we all must strive for. I don’t know if that was his dream, or if he is thinking about that at all during the performance, but only the thought of it was enough to lift me and strive for something greater than myself. What I found amusing is that while watching videos yesterday I felt the same. Music took me on this journey of self-discovery that took me totally by surprise.

Here we got an artist at his peak, a performance known by millions During my childhood that album was a must on everyone's houses, Yanni was everywhere. After my stroll on memory lane I decided to look for the sheet music of “One man’s dream” and start my journey with it on my digital piano.

Every time I play, is like time stand still, nothing can get into my zone, is me and my music. Hours pass by without me even noticing it, music has that power over me, but the more I talk to young people, the more I realize that music is something from another time, the new generation has found new way to unwind and fill their time.

Music nowadays is just a complement; music cannot stand on its own to Generation Z. To them is something that serve as soundtrack to something else, in this case, videogames. I was a kid when the first Nintendo became mainstream, I had several consoles before that one, I played video games like many from my generation (I’m not an Alien) but music was something else. A common threat was to save money and buy records, look obsessively at the cover and liner notes with the uttermost detail. To listen to the thing all the way through with no interruptions was the norm. Talk music with my friends is something that I still enjoy, to buy records and have a vast music collection was and still is a big part of who I am.

By Ralston Smith on Unsplash

The fun part of today’s rant is the fact that the son of one of my cousins, an eloquent 12-years-old with a soft spot for Fornite said to me that Music is not interesting enough for him. There’s no reward, he is not winning anything, to him is a giant waste of time.

When I was a kid I wanted to emulate Neil Peart, to be the best drummer in rock history. My friend and I use to play some Kiss covers totally immersed into our instruments, those were our heroes. To be able to play some challenging riffs, accurate drum fills and almost acrobatic scales made us dream and encourage us to rehearsal and practice always with a smile on our faces. To get there with a sloppy-but-kind-of-decent famous drum fill was something to be proud of, how many time my friend greeted me bass in hand with a new bass line for our semi-original tunes?

Neil Peart behind his drumset in mid 1970s

Nowadays kids emulate gamers, people sitting in front of a screen doing nothing in my opinion, a drummer is using his whole body fully engaged into his playing, the same with a bass player or a guitar player. Let’s take as an example a piano player, skillfully taking care of melody in one hand while the other hand focus on the rhythm. Both sides of his brain are in total synergy, a complex task becomes soothing music, pure magic, right there.

By Tadas Mikuckis on Unsplash

I’m not saying that you have to be a musician to enjoy music, not at all, music has the ability to touch the inner layers of your psyche, music is much more than random dots on white paper. What you think, am I taking this too seriously?

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About the Creator

Giovanni Profeta

Swimming through life one stroke at a time.

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