Canadian Musicians Employment Status Archive LONDON FREE PRESS Saturday April 1, 2000
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR London's musical legacy is second to none Regarding why the city should support Orchestra London Canada. I brag often to people around the world about the great quality of life we have in London. My first words are always: "We have a great orchestra, fine choral music, very good theatre and enough good restaurants to get by." The philistines that run city hall seem to feel that great music is only for the elites and that few Londoners are interested in it. They need to understand London can rightly claim to be the choral capital of Canada, thanks to the heritage left us by Martin Boundy and UWO professor Deral Johnson, one of the world's leading teachers of choral conducting. Their successors have given tens of thousands of young Londoners and their parents an appreciation of fine music. This history has created a need that must be satisfied. Nietsche put it thus: "What is it that my whole body really expects of music . . . ? I believe, its own ease: as if all animal function should be quickened by easy, bold, exuberant, self-assured rhythms; as if iron, leaden life should lose its gravity through golden, tender, oil-smooth melodies. My melancholy wants to rest in the hiding-places and abysses of perfection; that is why I need music."
DAVID SPENCE
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