After reading Jagjit Singh's, Pyarelal's and Ali Khan's comments about ARR and his music, it also struck me the big generational differences in terms of attitudes and exposure towards music. Personally, I have found that even with people I know, like my parents and their friends, their appreciation for music is within a narrow range. Anything outside that range is overlooked and not appreciated as much, and sometimes ridiculed. I have found that amongst many elders, there is a certain arrogance or haughtiness implying, "we know what's best". This is a product of our culture revering elders and their wisdom by tradition in contrast to many seniors and elders feeling left out and disrespected by attitudinal changes in today's world reflecting less respect and reverie towards seniors.
For example, when I gave my parents a copy of the D6 CD, they only liked the folk and semi-classical elements of the soundtrack. That's it. When I asked them about Jaane Tu, they said that they didn't like the music, although they love and appreciate ARR's other works that are more in line with their taste. Of course, even within elders, there will be a lot of variation in terms of taste and attitude, but overall, I feel that they are more narrow minded about music than we youngsters are OVERALL AS A GROUP, keeping in mind individual differences. Because ARR's music is so diverse and touching upon so many different genres, a large percentage of his work is not going to be appreciated by those with more narrow minded definitions of good music. Who knows, maybe when we reach that age, we too may reflect some of that narrow mindedness in terms of our exposure compared to what the youth may be listening to at that time. However, I have hope that because we youngsters have been exposed to such an array of world music through ARR and other artists, I think we will generally have a broader appreciation for music than previous generations. ARR has gifted us with something very important: tolerance and open mindedness for different types of music. Thank you ARR!
