The question of "genre"

Where does one kind of music end and another begin? How much do we invest in the distinctions between genres, when the differences between them may not be that great? Someone famously said, “There are only two kinds of music, good and bad.” That the quote has been attributed to musicians as varied in their backgrounds as Duke Ellington and Richard Strauss attests to its basis in fact: Musicians make music from the language at hand. “Genre” has nothing to do with it.

The above opens a piece I wrote about a year ago for The Desert Advocate here in Phoenix. The subsequent article took an unexpected turn and never came back to address further the idea that genre is irrelevant to the enjoyment of, criticism of, and, most especially, the creation of music. I post this as a reminder to myself to explore it further. If anything, I now believe that the entire notion of genre is not merely irrelevant, but in many ways damaging to music.

More anon....

- KLF