If it is true that the history of music has come to an end, what is left of music? Silence?
-Milan Kundera
The Book of Laughter and Forgetting
The other day I was listening to the song Awaken by the group Yes. Though it is technically in the rock genre, it could best be described as New Age Classical. (Did the term “New Age” exist in 1977?) Perhaps I’m a dinosaur, but there has been very little rock music that has come out in the last few years that has impressed me. When I listen to old stuff like this, I realize that very few contemporary musicians even have the ability to perform something like this. Regardless of whether you hate it or love it, the technical mastery is there. Ask any true musician and they will tell you just how difficult a typical Yes song is to play.
Unfortunately, the days of true musicianship seem to be gone. Where are the Robin Trowers, Rick Wakemans, Bill Brufords, and Eddie Jobsons of 2009? They don’t exist.They have been replaced by people with drum machines, samplers, and a bad grasp of the language.
