I used to think a sure sign of old age was having the rebellious music of one’s youth turned into bland elevator music. One could rise to the tenth floor of a building listening to a second rate orchestra with sobbing violins render a hoarse-voiced, liquor toting, Janis Joplin song into something that could softly fill the quiet in a crowded elevator. It was not Janice however, but the Beatles who were and remain the staple of canned Musak selections from my era. That group of shaggy-haired band members, who had rendered thousands of teenaged girls into screaming fanatics, were now reduced into life’s background music. Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds, which the young and initiated knew referred to LSD and smiled to themselves knowing that their less-than-cool parents were not in on the secret, now played gently and generically in the background.
But my definition of musical old age has now gone to another level. I do not even recognize the song that is playing relentlessly in the background. I discovered this recently as I lay in the dentist’s chair waiting for the Novocain to kick in. I was alone in the room, and was listening to tune after tune that were completely unknown to me. This music had had time to be popular, then fade from the charts only to end up as a recording in a medical office. I was not part of the initial popularity, much less the now orchestrated version, so I could not hum along with piped-in music as my young dental technician was soon doing under her breath. My musical life had slipped completely out of view, and with it the last vestiges of my musical youth.
But one last experience sealed my musical fate when someone, to my amazement, actually asked what kind of music I would like to hear. Without thinking, I answered that I enjoyed classical music at which his face became a puzzled frown. He then disappeared into the nether regions of the room to try and process my request. When he came back the background music had changed into one with a heavy modern beat while his frown had been transformed into a happy smile. He announced that he had found the classic rock station which would now be played for me. I looked at his satisfied face, and smiled resignedly back. So much for my musical request. But I found comfort in the fact that if my musical life was now to be sent to the scrap pile at least I was in pretty good company. In addition to Bach, Handel and Beethoven there still existed somewhere the original, unorchestrated Janis Joplin and Beatles.