Originally posted by elmo
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On the subject of jazz & classical music I recently came across this paragraph in Alan Zeffertt’s excellent book ‘Past a Joke’ about growing up in Portsmouth and attending Portsmouth Grammar School:
”In 1948, the guest at the school’s Speech Day was the famous conductor, Sir Adrian Boult. After his address, he asked the assembled throng if there were any questions. I rose and inquired of the distinguished knight what his views on jazz might be. “It should have been strangled at birth along with its protagonists and adherents,” he sneered. The headmaster dutifully shook with laughter, a number of the staff smiled, some of the boys tittered.
I was summoned to the headmaster’s study later and admonished for insulting our visitor with trivia. It was as if I had brought the school into disrepute. My own reaction was equally ridiculous for I vowed, henceforth, never again to listen to classical music. (Indeed, it was not until my present wife gently showed me the error of my ways, some twenty years afterwards, that I relented and began to collect classical records. But jazz is still my first love. And I’ve never forgiven Sir Adrian Boult.)”
I suspect that this prejudice against jazz still exists among many classical music fans.
JR
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