Calling You An Idiot Would Be An

The Art Snob Can Be Recognized In The Home By The Quick Look He Gives The Pictures On Your Walls, Quick But Penetrating, As Though He Were Undressing Them. This Is Followed Either By Complete And Pained Silence Or A Comment Such As 'that's Really A Very Pleasant Little Water Color You Have There.

Any Real New Yorker Is A You-name-it-we-have-it-snob Whose Heart Brims With Sympathy For The Millions Of Unfortunates Who Through Misfortune, Misguidedness Or Pure Stupidity Live Anywhere Else In The World.

Improvisation Was The Blood And Bone Of Jazz, And In The Classic, New Orleans Jazz It Was Collective Improvisation In Which Each Performer, Seemingly Going His Own Melodic Way, Played In Harmony, Dissonance, Or Counterpoint With The Improvisations Of His Colleagues. Quite Unlike Ragtime, Which Was Written Down In Many Cases By Its Composers And Could Be Repeated Note For Note (if Not Expression For Expression) By Others, Jazz Was A Performer's Not A Composer's Art.

If You Took An Iq Test, The Results Would Be Negative.

The World Of The Arts Is By No Means Always Comfortable, But Neither Is It Likely Ever To Be Boring. It Is Full Of Surprises, Humor, Traps For The Unwary, And Challenges To Smugness. It Is A World Of Moods As Well As Of Revelation, Of Beliefs And Fears, Of Unpleasant Truth As Well As Of Delicious Fantasy. Perhaps It Is Arrogant To Say That Anyone Who Does Not Venture Into This World Is Only Half-interested In Life. I Say It, Nonetheless.