World Music

Just been gathering my thoughts of late.
This particular form of music is actually very vague. It seems to me that anything that can't be labeled under some specific is dumped here, which is unfair. I listen to several bands who are called jazz or world music, depending on who you talk to. Shahin & Sepehr is one such duo; they are Iranian-American and incorporate a lot of traditional instruments into their music. Much of the time, I would call what they do light jazz. It is rare to hear anything in their music that would separate them from such bands as Spyro Gyra (except maybe the lack of horns.) I would like to see either labels being better defined, or better still, eliminated. As one who worked in a record store for many years, I believe there is too much emphasis put on separating certain music. Of course, I would be upsetting the status quo; people just don't take well to abrupt changes in their environment, and as my age group is quickly getting up there, they are bound to get pickier still. (!)Heaven knows what some would do if they had to look through Mozart to find Motorhead. I was myself rather offended by that smelly leather covered album they put out in the early '80s. (Leave it to Lemmy....)

Not to get too far from the subject I started this thing for, I have seen Del Castillo put in Latin, jazz, and popular ( another dump bin for unclassifiables.) I am personally a little tickled to see them cross over in that way, but often wonder if they get a fair shake when multi-categorized that way. Someone new comes looking for them, looks and looks and might leave if s/he has no success. Many folks don't like looking foolish not knowing where to find a particular artist.

Anyway, I vote for getting rid of yet another barrier between people! Free the music!

(Okay, I'll lay off the coffee....)