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Originally Posted by Trollheart
Yeah I agree. This questionnaire is very heavily based on "older" music, from jaz to blues and right back to classical. Had he asked who plays bass in Slayer or name both Iron Maiden guitarists, or maybe what was The Pet Shop Boys' most successful album, I think a lot more people would know these things.
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I have no interest in helping anyone pass. I'm interested in what musical foundation they stand on because that tells me how good of a job we do passing on our musical legacy.
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Like Necro says, even he and I, at the fifty-year mark, are stumped by some of these questions, so how are kids going to know?
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Nothing if we don't teach them about it.
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Look at the list: how many questions refer to music/artistes less than 40 years old in terms of how long they've been around.
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Hopefully none. Our musical legacy is far, far older than that. You can't determine how well a 14 yo girl has been educated musically by questioning her about Justin Bieber. Of course she knows who he is. But does she know what made his music even possible? I seriously doubt it (I doubt Bieber knows either). For example, do you think Bieber might own a HUGE debt to this man?
EDDIE HOLMAN hey there lonely girl original video - YouTube
And if I meet a 14 yo girl and ask her why she listens to Bieber trash and she says, "He's carrying on a great crooning tradition that goes back to Eddie Holman and Smokey Robinson and Clyde McPhatter and Nolan Strong" I'd have to conclude this person is no idiot. But as of right now I can't conclude these girls that listen to him are anything else but idiots.
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I mean: Scott Joplin? Give me a break! Seriously. More "modern" questions will give you a far fairer and more balanced result.
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That would be missing the point entirely. I'm asking about Joplin because people should know about Scott Joplin. Why? Because he is one of the most important composers that ever lived. How? Because he inspired people like Irving Berlin to write "Alexander's Ragtime Band" (actually, Berlin stole part of a Joplin piece and used it in the song for which Joplin was highly displeased) and a million singers have done that song which is what gave you the later artists you think I should be concentrating on. Joplin's rags were loved by a cornetist named King Oliver so much that he had the sheet music bound into one volume so he could practice them. When he took on a student, he taught that kid how to play them because he wanted the kid to learn the difference between jazz and blues. That kid was Louis Armstrong--one of the most important musical figures EVER.
So would it kill a person to go back and listen to Joplin? That's what I did and I became a Joplin devotee. In fact, I became a ragtime devotee. I am far more musically enriched because of that than I could ever have been had I never bothered. Who is a better pianist--a kid who can only play Lady Gaga and Alicia Keyes or one who can play that as well as Beethoven, Joplin and Art Tatum (and if you haven't listened to Art Tatum prepare to be astounded)?
David Lee Roth is all well and good but he himself said in interviews that people really should hear this version:
Louis Prima - Just a Gigolo - JazzAndBluesExperience - YouTube
Wouldn't it be a shame if the only version we remember for posterity is Roth's--oh, wait!--that IS how we remember it.
Or how about this?
TINY BRADSHAW ~ THE TRAIN KEPT A-ROLLIN ~ 1951 - YouTube
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Can I have my tuppence worth back now please?
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Wouldn't you rather do a little deeper musical exploration? Isn't that at least partly why you're here?