At dinner with friends over the weekend I was asked why I don't listen to classical music. The chief reason is that I don't understand enough about it to really grasp what's happening when I'm listening to it. Truthfully, I really don't know what is even meant by the term "classical music" which is frequently applied to orchestral music, probably composed within a particular historical period, but is also applied to string quartets, and things like opera and, the subject of this video, baroque music. As it happens I have a friend who plays viola de gamba, so I've heard some of this sort of music, and even seen a Theorbo being played before. I've enjoyed the music, but it seems to me that a better knowledge of the history of this music, the theory of its structure, and the technology of the instruments is called for in order to understand what's happening. When I listen to jazz, or the blues, or rock and roll-- or even the music that derives from the English folk traditions, like bluegrass or country & western-- I have that context for the most part.
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