When I was a senior, I took the basic Music class, pass-fail, just in the hope that I'd finally learn something about classical music (spoiler: I did it on my own, well after college).
Surprise, surprise: I had an African-American woman teacher, and she exposed us to a lot of blues & gospel music & jazz, as well as classical. We actually had Thomas Dorsey (Take My Hand, Precious Lord) and Furry Lewis visit the class. How many times are you going to luck into something like that?
Since I spent lunch time at the library rather than go home, I also checked out jazz records and listened to them, like Monk, Miles, and Trane. What was supposed to be a primer in classical music instead turned into a lifetime passion for American roots music.
This is no disrespect to either Bach chorales, or whatever is the opposite.
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When I was a senior, I took the basic Music class, pass-fail, just in the hope that I'd finally learn something about classical music (spoiler: I did it on my own, well after college).
Surprise, surprise: I had an African-American woman teacher, and she exposed us to a lot of blues & gospel music & jazz, as well as classical. We actually had Thomas Dorsey (Take My Hand, Precious Lord) and Furry Lewis visit the class. How many times are you going to luck into something like that?
Since I spent lunch time at the library rather than go home, I also checked out jazz records and listened to them, like Monk, Miles, and Trane. What was supposed to be a primer in classical music instead turned into a lifetime passion for American roots music.
This is no disrespect to either Bach chorales, or whatever is the opposite.