The Changing Face (& Ear & Nose) of Music

Much has been made about the closing of Sam, the Record Man, on Yonge Street.

As it should, as this is clearly a sign of the times and the signalling of a passing era. Beset by iPod, the net, YouTube, Myspace, iTunes, Facebook and, even more importantly, Wal-Mart's unbeatable purchasing and discount selling power, hardly a record store known to humankind can survive. When McCartney launches his latest CD at Starbucks, you know something is afoot.

(Completely aside, have you ever seen a music man less joyful? What is this fellow's problem? He if doesn't have life by the knackers, which of us does? If you watch the PBS documentary, "The Making of Duets: Tony Bennett & Guests," you will see a laughing, smiling, joyful Jim Taylor, Elton John, Michael Buble, Diana Krall et al, and this dour, serious, CORPORATE Paul McCartney. It is passing strange, my friends.)

But I believe there is something even deeper at play here than the onslaught on new technologies and the dominance of an overpowering marketer. Even specialty record shops - classical, jazz, Latin - are having trouble surviving.

I'll tell you why.

Last year I went into the now disappeared "Magic Flute" on West 4th Avenue. This is a store I tended to avoid because it was always, in my experience, way less than magical. Often rude and snooty and unhelpful and self-involved would be closer to the truth. But last year, I went in and, unable to find what I wanted, I asked the young lady to point me to Jascha Heifetz. If you Google Heifetz, you will see him referred to at once as "The Violinist of the Century."

Of course, the young lady had no idea who of what I was talking about. Is he a composer? And so on. Can you expect to run a classical music store with employees who have never heard of Heifetz?

Beyond all of those other factors (which are very much at play), I think the deeper reason for the end of the record store as we may have known it is an abiding ignorance and self-absorption. It is yet another reflection of our adolescent culture.

Goo-goo, ga-ga.