I was a weird kid. I listened to my generation's music, but also listened and loved my parent's music, jazz, and classical music as well.

I gig two afternoons a week at an outdoor restaurant adjacent to a big city park and the public beach. The majority of our music on this gig is pitched to +50-year-old and up audience. They are a good mid-afternoon crowd and fill the restaurant during the normally dead times. Plus it's good food, not fast food, and the prices reflect that.

It runs from an occasional Sinatra era song, an occasional 21st century song, some Calypso/Soca/Reggae, a bit of country, some Musica Latina, but probably about 3/4 Baby-Boomer era pop/rock.

It all depends on who is there and what seems to be working that day.

I'm no longer surprised at the number of young people who not only enjoy the music, give us complements and sing along, knowing the words. But I'm always delighted by it.

It's been spring break season, so there have been a lot of young people stop in, and we're always happy to entertain them.

I don't want to sound like an old curmudgeon, but I find a lot of today's music boring. Of course, a lot of the music of my own era is boring too. And there are some very good songs and artists making music today.

The two problems (for me) I find in a lot of today's music are:

1) Rap. To me music needs all 3 elements, melody, harmony and rhythm. Rap lacks melody. Of course, poetry to some background rhythm is an art form in itself, but it doesn't satisfy my like music.

2) Excessive auto-tune. It takes too many human conversational nuances out of the melody.

But if the music that I don't care for has an audience, it doesn't mean it's bad music, just music that wasn't made for me.

Notes ♫

Bob "Notes" Norton smile Norton Music
https://www.nortonmusic.com

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