Do our music taste change as we age?

[Smokey]

I'm not talking about drastic change in music taste such as going from punk to country :D

What I meant was subtle changes such as once we love it loud, hard and fast, now prefer the softer side of music from the same or different genre. I loved alternative 80's music and still do, but now seek softer and vocal music from 60's and 70's. And sometime even go down further to 1940's starting with Ink Spots.

Don't know. It might just be me getting old :)

[JohnMichael]

When I was young, if I can remember back that far, I needed the vocalist and the words to enjoy the music. As I have aged I can enjoy the emotions of music as pure instrumental experiences. I still enjoy the singer but no longer need them to feel the emotions of music.

The beauty and the voice of classical music and instrumental jazz moves me today.

My musical interests runs for centuries from early clasical to modern day music. Vocal or instrumental as long as it stirs my heart.

My mother thought music should always be pretty. She did not understand my music that for whatever reason was not pretty. Music could help me rage and heal.

[(O0o*o0O)]

My early years included Black Sabbath, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, Judas Priest, Testament, Billy Idol, Phil Collins, and maybe some Iggy Pop.

Early teenage years I was into Public Enemy, Too Short, EPMD, Gang Starr, Germs, Dead Kennedys, Crass, Nirvana, Primus, "Prince", Color Me Bad, Bobby Brown, and R&B.

Later teenage years I got into Christian Death, Joy Division, Die Form, Laibach, Pigface, The Cramps, and anything Bill Laswell.

Early 20's came the or I should say came the return of death metal including Decide, an all time favorite Obituary, Slayer, Danzig, and Techno! (Lots of Drugs)

Later 20's came an interest in Classical and older Jazz. Lots of CCR, Neil Young, King Crimson, and Acid Rock.

Now I'm hooked on downers man! Just buying CD's and exploring. David Allin Coe and GG Allin are recent favorites.:thumbsup:

[Rae]

Yes.

~Rae

[Mr Peabody]

I don't know if you'd say my taste changed so much as it has expanded. As a kid some of my first records were Mandy by Barry Manilow and Mellow by Olivia Newton John, as I became a teen it was straight Hard Rock and Metal with no deviation. After some years I accepted some Dance music for the bass content, car audio contests you know. I eventually discovered Fusion and as my interest in better audio grew I branched off into more traditional Jazz, some Classical. I still like Hard Rock, Metal, Classic Rock but open to most anything to see if I like it. Another thing that got me to expand was a renewed interest in my turntable and getting large batches of vinyl from where ever, as I went through them I'd listen to the stuff I hadn't heard before and found I like uncharacteristic things to me like Neil Diamond, Pearl Bailey, I learned not all of Nat King Cole was "candlelight". Also, I found that things I heard as a kid but didn't really accept influenced me. For instance, I have some Country in my collection, all my parents listened to, and it's more traditional Country, I don't like most of what's on the radio today. Also, I had friends who were into Soul/R&B, that's an area my collection is growing in from new artists like Vivian Green to not so new Earth Wind & Fire to Chi-Lites.

[Slosh]

It evolves and becomes more sophisticated. Everything I like today has roots in and elements of what I liked as a kid. I still like pretty much everything I did when I was a teenager, but there's only so many times you can listen to the same music over and over. To me there's a natural path from Reign In Blood to Purple Rain to In The Reins :)

[MasterCylinder]

Now I'm hooked on downers man! Just buying CD's and exploring.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Do a quart of cheap gin while checking out Robin Trower's BRIDGE OF SIGHS.

[Luvin Da Blues]

Now I'm hooked on downers man! Just buying CD's and exploring.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Do a quart of cheap gin while checking out Robin Trower's BRIDGE OF SIGHS.

Really? Trower deserves the good stuff duntcha think. :4:

[Troy]

Yeah, totally normal.

[recoveryone]

I grew up listening to Motown and Gospel, my older brother introduce me to Jimi Hendrix and Jazz. in 73 on a family trip to Texas I was dipped in the P-Funk. from there I have been open to various types of music, but I became more critical of real artist vs one hit wonders in the 80's. Prices of albums were going up and the new 12" format was king for all us house party DJ's. I never was sold 100% on rap, but it has its place. I now listens to Neo Soul: Goapele, Vivian Green, Jill Scott, Kem.... and Smooth Jazz. From time to time I still want to get up on the down stroke and be knee deep with the Atomic Dog and take a dip in the pool and do the Aqua boogie and get my Flashlight out when its dark but most of all I just want to have One Nation under a groove. Its mainly what type of mood I am in, thats why I like my Squeezebox so much and digital formated music which allows you to bring large collection of your music anywhere in the house or in your car, so when the mood strikes I can listen to David Graig and hit a button and hear E-40 and still switch back and listen to my high school theme song, Mr. Magic by Grover Washington.

[Smokey]

I don't know if you'd say my taste changed so much as it has expanded.

You're right. Expand in taste is probably more accurate word than change as it is evident from everybody's post. It seems we never dislike the music we thrived on when younger.

[Jack in Wilmington]

I grew up listening to Motown and Gospel, my older brother introduce me to Jimi Hendrix and Jazz. in 73 on a family trip to Texas I was dipped in the P-Funk. from there I have been open to various types of music, but I became more critical of real artist vs one hit wonders in the 80's. Prices of albums were going up and the new 12" format was king for all us house party DJ's. I never was sold 100% on rap, but it has its place. I now listens to Neo Soul: Goapele, Vivian Green, Jill Scott, Kem.... and Smooth Jazz. From time to time I still want to get up on the down stroke and be knee deep with the Atomic Dog and take a dip in the pool and do the Aqua boogie and get my Flashlight out when its dark but most of all I just want to have One Nation under a groove. Its mainly what type of mood I am in, thats why I like my Squeezebox so much and digital formated music which allows you to bring large collection of your music anywhere in the house or in your car, so when the mood strikes I can listen to David Graig and hit a button and hear E-40 and still switch back and listen to my high school theme song, Mr. Magic by Grover Washington.


That sounds like me. In the 60's during high school it was motown. Friday and Saturday night there was always a dance going on somewhere. Then Woodstock and I was changed forever. I couldn't buy the music fast enough. Vinyl or cassette, sometimes both so I could listen to it in the car. Then reel to reel and then CD's.

Now I've sort of come full circle, back to vinyl. I never would have seen that coming. I still love the 70's rock music. It's sort of timeless. But as my stereo system has evolved into a nice passtime and hobby, I have really come to appreciate a great classical recording and jazz has been taking up a larger section of my music library. I would say that 90% of my music purchases last year were classical or jazz. What's fun about classical is that I have some pieces, like Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 4, by four different orchestras and different conductors. They are all distinct in their own way and fit different modes.

[Mr Peabody]

I've talked with Classical lovers who have several of the same pieces by different conductors and orchestras, I have not reached that level of appreciation yet.

[3LB]

I don't know if you'd say my taste changed so much as it has expanded.

This.

[Mr MidFi]

I came of age in the mid-70s, in the heyday of prog and 'hard-rock'. My very first album purchases, when I was just a lad, were ELP's Pictures at an Exhibition and Led Zeppelin's untitled fourth album.

I hadn't listened to ELP in a very, very long time... but I recently picked up a best-of disc at a garage sale and just listened to it this morning on my way to work. Damn, that is some weird-ass stuff. No wonder my mother always sounded so concerned about me.

Back to the point of this thread... I don't see myself listening to that disc much anymore. Nostalgia value aside, I just don't want to hear that stuff these days. (But I'll still play Zeppelin on occasion, fwiw.)

[nobody]

My tastes have always been all over the board for the most part so hard to say. But, I do listen to more laid back stuff as I get older. Mostly though, it seems to depend for me on what I'm doing. If I'm out and about a lot, I'll keep listening to energetic stuff. But, if I'm doing a lot of hanging around the house, I never really wanna throw on some Black Flag and get all hyped up so I can sit in a chair. And, probably the older I get the more laid back activities I am doing so my music listening generally reflects that.

I would also say that the older I get the more open to styles I never cared about before I get, which I think may be the opposite of what I hear most people do. But, I think I get less and less concerned about listening within any sort of prescribed area and more curious about what's out there that I've missed out on. Admittedly, many times when I decide I should look into something I never cared to listen to before, I mostly soon after figure out why I skipped it in the first place, but every now and then, something surprises me. Probably more often, I start exploring deeper things I was moderately aware of an interested in but just never took the time to dig deeper.

[Mr Peabody]

[QUOTE=Mr MidFi]I
I hadn't listened to ELP in a very, very long time... but I recently picked up a best-of disc at a garage sale and just listened to it this morning on my way to work. Damn, that is some weird-ass stuff. No wonder my mother always sounded so concerned about me. LOL

" NO.... ALL I WANTED WAS A PEPSI"! "NO, I'M NOT ON DRUGS ALL I WANTED WAS A PEPSI"

[Mr MidFi]

[QUOTE=Mr MidFi]I
I hadn't listened to ELP in a very, very long time... but I recently picked up a best-of disc at a garage sale and just listened to it this morning on my way to work. Damn, that is some weird-ass stuff. No wonder my mother always sounded so concerned about me. LOL

" NO.... ALL I WANTED WAS A PEPSI"! "NO, I'M NOT ON DRUGS ALL I WANTED WAS A PEPSI"

And SHE WOULDN'T GIVE IT TO ME!!!!

Goddamn, that song was awesome. I haven't listened to the ST's in a long, long time either...

[Pat D]

I still like some of the music I liked as a child, though I don't play Bolero and March of the Boyars over and over again anymore as I did when I was very young.

My father played the Poet and Peasant Overture by Suppe at night, and I still like overtures. He also had some easy lisening jazz vocals, and I still like some jazz. He had some show music, as well, with Gordon McRae and others.

My mother liked Franck's Symphony in d minor and Brahms 1st and 3rd symphonies. We had a recording of Schubert's Unfinished Symphony and Rachmaninoff's Second. I like a lot of symphonies besides that now. My mother played piano pretty well, and when I was young, she did her scales about every day.

We had very little chamber music, Tchaikovsky's Theme and Variations is the one I remember. I now like a lot of chamber music.

We listened to the Metropolitan Opera Broadcasts on Saturday afternoons. I still like some opera.

We had some recordings of great singers: tenors such as Beniamino Gigli, Caruso, Bjoerling, Peerce, Melchior; baritones such as Leonard Warren and Robert Merrill; lower voices such as Pinza, Siepi, George London, and Jerome Hines; mezzos such as Rise Stevens and Blanche Thebom; sopranos such as Novotna, Maria Caniglia, Flagstad, Traubel, Licia Albanese, Lily Pons, Roberta Peters, and Zinka Milanov. Both my brothers were tenors, one a music major. I'm just a baritone, a pretty good one for an amateur.

Moving on to the teen years, my brother liked some of the big orchestral pieces like the Mussorgsky-Ravel Pictures at an Exhibition, Night on Bald Mountain (well, not my favorite!), and Ippolitov-Ivanov's Caucasian Sketches--I still like it, too. We had a recording of Mozart's Requiem with the Robert Shaw Chorale which I listened to a lot. I still think the parts Mozart wrote are marvelous.

At the university level, I become acquainted and performed some bigger choral works such as Handel's Messiah and Bach's Motets and Magnificat. I like Peter, Paul, and Mary, too and Joan Baez. I never did get all that much into rock.

Out on my own, buying records and with my own system, I acquired recordings of some operas, symphonies, and later, string quartets, some electronic music, and some world music. Though I am a long time choral singer and sometime soloist, I never did collect all that many recordings of choral music except Christmas music. What I could perform wasn't usually my favorite music. OIf course, Messiah, Bach's Magnificat, and requiems by Mozart, Brahms, and Faure are among my favorite works.

I just keep branching out, slowly, learning more and more. But that means I play lots of mostly classical music of different genres, styles, and periods, though when I get new recordings I find interesting, I will concentrate on them. For example, I just got the Beethoven Symphonies conducted by Ernest Ansermet and the Orchestra of the Suisse Romande (I have them on LP) and can compare them with Karajan 1963, Otmar Suitner, and Leibowitz, especially. I got a lovely CD of the Mozart and Brahms Clarinet Quintet with Reginald Kell, clarinet, and the Chicago Fine Arts Quartet, recorded in 1958, which I like a lot.

The newest granddaughter, 1.5 years, often comes during the day and so I hear all sorts of nursery songs. I remember some of them.

[RGA]

I started out listening mostly to pop/rock in the mid to late 80's (not the best place to start in a sense). Aerosmith, Motley Crue, AC/DC, Def Lepard, The Outfield, and the like. But I also had a pop streak at that time and numerous female friends - so Banarama, Madonna, Roxette, Cyndi Lauper, and some of the boys that girls liked - Richard Marx, Corey Hart, Bon Jovi, Michael Jackson, David Bowie, etc would be played at their places. Suffice it to say classical and Jazz were viewed as "old people's music," and country music was pretty much a complete dead zone where I grew up in Canada until Shania Twain came along and generated interest in the likes of Johnny Cash among others. I never make light of the kids I teach today who have notes all over their desk of their love of Justin Beiber or the Lady Gaga lovers.

While my tastes have changed I still enjoy the odd AC DC session or Guns and Roses and I even like Lady Gaga - I get the sense she will last longer than the usual and that she has mixed dance elements of disco from ABBA with the visual and sex appeal and image promotion of Madonna. ABBA meets Madonna = sales beyond belief and she was the biggest selling female artist last year - maybe the biggest selling artist of the year period at $68 million. Interestingly I gave my 73 year old mother Lady Gaga to take with her on a bus trip to Reno - and the senior citizens on the bus were grooving to it - It's complete bubble gum cheese pop but it's fun.

Anyway, my taste did change to the point where Motley Crue (my first concert Dr. Feelgood tour) and Aerosmith Etc changed to Phil Collins, The Eagles, Celine Dion (before she drove everyone crazy - first two albums), Sarah McLachlan (who I first heard on the TV show Due South which was such perfect music for the best episodes of that show) and Jackson Browne, Pink Floyd, Sade, and the like. Classical and Jazz were on the cusp as I was buying the more known mainstream but I suppose "rocks" of both like Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Dave Brubeck, King Crimson, Vivaldi, Mozart, Beethoven, Bach, Rachmaninof, Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Albinoni, Corelli to newer age music like Acoustic Alchemy, Mike Oldfield.

Though I always enjoyed classical music the learning curve was and still is massive for non musicians and with radio stations not being much help and album prices typically double what a pop album costs and with classical often sounding so bad on boom boxes, walkmans and in cars - it is not the most friendly to the average young person who never really gets to listen to this music the way it can be presented properly. It greatly helps to grow up in a family where this music is played by parents of is a factor in the every day life of growing up. To walk into classical music as a relative newbie is incredibly overwhelming. Naxos I always liked because they gave out a pretty great little starter kit at the big box chain A&B Sound in the 90's. The book was of course partly self promotion but nevertheless it was quite good listing the 100-200 classical albums you need to buy with coherent descriptions on the different periods and forms, biographies on the major composers, their music, why it is important, their significance etc etc. And it also helped that you could pay $7 and get often very well recorded albums - but not quite the best musicians.

The classical and Jazz part of my collection is growing generally much faster than anything else because I think what happens is that POP music while FUN and while I do buy the odd album does tend to be somewhat repetitive and kind of like the romance novel analogy on of my English professors used. She buys romance novels reads them and enjoys them and then never reads it again. There isn't really a lot of substance that can hold up on numerous readings - Literature on the other hand can be read, re read, read in different ways, and you can go into great depth writing essays about various themes and takes on the way things can be interpreted. I don't want to dump on rock classical because some bands do have a wealth of "literature" in their lyrics which can possess a great deal of power and a certain degree of timelessness - great songwriting can last. But the fun cheeseball music of Madonna and Lady Gaga don't really write any music that will put them beyond the level of the romance novel - fun in the now and their next song might be fun too but these artists are famous as artists not necessarily for their creations. Although I have to say I still hear Holiday played 25 years later in the clubs but that's probably because everyone likes to be on a holiday.

Anyway, classical jazz and "some" rock and pop lasts due to their "literature" analogy and their quality of musicianship.

The only form of music I don't really like much are the Rap and rap variants (hip hop) because while it is poetry to music I just don't like the way the poetry is delivered - I don't like the sound of playing a record player as an instrument with the screeches, I find the bass beats incredibly monotonous and the singing ability atrocious. JayZ is hugely popular - I listened to a song called "Empire State of Mind" which is great when I'm teaching P.E. but I like it because Alicia Keys can sing and her bit is the best bit.

Here is the JayZ version which does have more meat to it in terms of lyrics but I can't just sit and listen to it in a sit down in front of the stereo kind of way. The Alicia Keys only version I can.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UjsXo9l6I8

Now listen to the Alicia Keys only version http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4XEBNYiIws&feature=related

To me music is so vast back in time and ever changing (kind of) going forward and I don't want to get trapped in the 1600s listening to one genre played 40 different ways. I like bands like Nightwish that take an Opera singer - and put a metal band behind her to create symphonic metal. I have never really liked Opera (great voices great talent but I generally don't care for it) and Metal is fatiguing to me. Blend it together and takes on a kind of interesting character - but still in limited doses - perhaps the operatic vocals with rock instead of metal would make me happier than the metal..

Here's an example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80kOBeMEm2I

I have gotten somewhat tired of Operatic voices that show of the voice as an instrument but it usually sounds overbearing and simplistic and overly dramatic or "forced" like music's equivalent of Telvisions' soap opera

[JohnMichael]

I came of age in the mid-70s, in the heyday of prog and 'hard-rock'. My very first album purchases, when I was just a lad, were ELP's Pictures at an Exhibition and Led Zeppelin's untitled fourth album.






I also owned and enjoyed Emerson Lake and Palmers "Pictures at an Exhibition" and it is that album that led me to classical music. I was walking through the record chain store "Peaches" when in the classical bin was "Pictures at an Exhibition" conducted by Ricardo Muti and the Philidelphia Orchestra. I bought it out of curiosity and my curiosity led me to other classical records.

I miss the mid 70's for both record and audio stores and oh my youth.

[Luvin Da Blues]

I'm not too sure if my tastes have changed per se. I just dug a little deeper into the roots of the music I grew up with in the 70's.

Started out with Led Zep, Stones, Ten Years After, Tull, etc. then moved on to Rory Gallagher, J Beck, Clapton (Blues), Savoy Brown, etc. because I loved the bluesier material. From there I really got into the blues of all kinds and still love it.

'Course I have a garnered a good appreciation for a lot of Jazz, Reggae and even the good country artists along the way.

[Smokey]

Anyway, my taste did change to the point where Motley Crue and Aerosmith Etc changed to Phil Collins, The Eagles, Celine Dion (before she drove everyone crazy - first two albums), Sarah McLachlan and Jackson Browne, Pink Floyd, Sade, and the like.

I would say that was a taste change for the better. Three bands I could not stand in 80's was Motley Crue, Aerosmith and Bon Jovi.

[RGA]

I would say that was a taste change for the better. Three bands I could not stand in 80's was Motley Crue, Aerosmith and Bon Jovi.

Yes and my taste changed from hard rock to vocalists and I still prefer Sarah McLachlan, Sophie Milman, Sade, Jackson Browne, Johnny Cash kind of stuff to virtually all rock bands when it comes to sitting and listening. A party or something is different but still. Jazz and vocals are probably my favorites today with classical but in general I prefer to set aside a large segment of uninterrupted time for classical which lately has been tough to find. I picked up about 300 classical LP's all in quite excellent shape so it will be nice to hear various version of similar pieces. I used to play the oboe and like pieces where it is placed as kind of the centerpiece. Damn it was a difficult instrument to play - I have a lot of respect for people who take that instrument and play it so well.

[JoeE SP9]

I think as we grow older most of us tend to expand our musical interests. At least that's been the case with me. Although I still listen to the music I've always liked I have expanded my tastes. Having 40+ Miles Davis LP's and CD's or 4 different versions of Bethoven's 9'th is something I never imagined 44+ years ago when I started collecting music.

Although I've grown, learned and have become a lot more tolerant of just about everything, Blue Grass and Gospel still don't work for me. I suppose my attitude about religion is a significant factor with Gospel. As for Blue Grass, hearing Bill Munroe's voice still makes me want to cut my ears off and run away. That has always influenced my feelings about Blue Grass. However, who knows, maybe I'll hear something tomorrow that will make me change my mind.

Been listening to these tonight:
Crazy Patsy Cline
Falaye Fanaan Ashley Beedle
Sideshow Blue Magic
Don't Lose Your Mind Miles Davis
La Isla Bonita Madonna
Lift Off Groove Collective
China Grove The Doobie Brothers
You Make Loving Fun Fleetwood Mack
Molena James Hunter
and many others

Having a wirelessly remote controlled music server sure comes in handy..It's the ultimate in convenience for couch potato's. All I need now is a waitress to deliver my favorite beverages.

[Feanor]

I never really got any musical exposure as a kid. My parents weren't interested in music; I just got a little of whatever was playing on the local general-interest AM radio station. My teenage years were the the heyday of Elvis Presley and his contemporaries but I never got into Rock 'n Roll.

In college started to develop some interest in folk music -- we're talking the Kingston Trio, then Bob Dylan and Joan Baez. A couple of years graduation after that I got my first stereo system; (Dynaco electronics and A25 speakers, and a Lenco t/t and Shure cartridge). I got further into folk, notably Baez, Collins, Mitchell, Ian & Sylvia, and Gordon Lightfoot; (today I retch at the very fhough of listening to Lightfoot). But then I got more into classical music, and since it has been my era of expansion.

Yeah, I pretty much started with Bolero, (a recording of which I'm not sure I could find in my collection today), and Debussy's La Mer. I proceed to Renaissance and Baroque; I loved Handel and Bach. Then to Hayden, Mozart and Beethoven. After awhile chamber music became my favorite subgenre as it still is today.

Today I like the Moderns, notably Shostakovich, Bartok, and Prokofiev. And starting about a dozen years or so ago, I became fairly interested in contemporary classical and am still expanding in this area. Today I especially like Elliott Carter, Pierre Boulez, and Harrison Birtwistle.

I like Schubert and some Dvorak but otherwise have struggled with the Romanitic era. I still haven't got much use for Brahms, and pretty much hate Schumann and Bruckner. I can tolerate a Mahler symphony once in a while.

After much struggle I've come to appreciated Schoenburg, Berg, and Webern, (the "Second Vienna School"). It wasn't easy.

The point is, though, that I have expanded my interest in classical and still strive to expose myself to more music -- and struggle to better appreciate the stuff I like less well such as Brahms.