A reader writes:
Regarding your blog entry about Kind of Blue: Coincidentally, this morning at the coffeeshop I frequent–in the middle of western Pennsylvania, as small-town as small-town gets–Kind of Blue was playing. One fellow who stopped in commented on it. This gentleman was black, which is not-so-common in this particular, quite homogeneous small town. Anyway, he, the proprietor, and the girl working behind the counter talked for a while about how seminal the album was, the geniuses who played on it and the music they made afterwards.
I thought at the time that the interchange was a great example of the bonding force of music, demonstrating its ability to help people find enough common ground to begin friendships. Perhaps it’s the music’s essential simplicity, as you say, that is truly at the core of this bonding force.