Something for Every Taste

I was on the Great Lawn tonight listening to the New York Philharmonic play Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6, “Pathéthique.” It’s a beautiful piece of music that was written a long time ago, yet is so easy to understand. Even though the park was crowded with listeners, hearing them brought me back to evenings I spent in mild and suburban Northern California.

I haven’t visited my home there in four years, but I can still recall very clearly the hues of the evening sky that would color people’s lawns and fruit trees. Like any teenager growing up in the suburbs, I fought the stifling experience with music. My four years in high school were scored with music from a pair of Grado SR80’s.

It’s commonplace for music to be seen in the same light as a drug, or a means to a kind of solitary intoxication. But upon closer examination I think it’s really more like food that we devour for sustenance, often selectively. “Pick your day and pick your music—there’s something for every taste...” The official website for Central Park states this before listing a long string of music events to take place in the park this summer.

Many people form close emotional bonds with specific kinds of music. Is there music that can move a broad range of listeners to readily ingest and absorb it? I think listening to music alone or with an audience as large as the one on the Great Lawn makes a significant impact on how we hear it.

This is especially evident when the musicians at Central Park complete their performance. Applause for them is from hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of satiated listeners.

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