A lady Buddhist scholar from Bangkok travelled up into the jungles of Thailand to meet with the esteemed Dhamma master Ajahn Chah, who lived much like the Buddha himself, in a humble forest monastery. Ajahn Chah was a teacher of extraordinary compassion and insight, an exemplar of the noblest ideals of the Buddhist vision. The scholar was a specialist in the Abhidhamma, a detailed and lengthy (!!) study of Buddhist psychology/philosophy that dates from well after the Buddha’s day. It stands to the Buddhist suttas as the Talmud does to the Torah. Most Buddhists never encounter Abhidhamma teachings, Buddhist post-post-graduate stuff that dwells far remote from everyday practice.
The scholar met with Ajahn Chah and asked the question she had journeyed so far to ask: do you teach Abhidhamma? To which Ajahn Chah beamed and replied: oh, yes, of course I teach Abhidhamma!
The scholar was delighted to hear that, so she asked her next question: what edition do you use? To which Ajahn Chah beamed all the more, and thumped his heart saying: this one!
Score: Ajahn Chah 10, Scholar 0. Game and match, Chah.
I have no problem coming up with musical versions of that story; just set it between a beloved heartfelt performer and some grad-school twit waving Urtext editions around. But I find a larger issue here, which is the relative rarity of broadly encompassing intellects in a world full of agenda-driven singularists who filter everything through a pinhole. Singularists are tiresomely common in the musical world, such as the irksome student whose only remark about the Schubert B-flat Sonata D. 960 was: are you playing the first-movement repeat? It changes everything, you know, it just changes everything. No chance for any other discussion there. Or the guy whose first reply on my mentioning that I was working on the Waldstein was: what are you going to do about the octave glissandos? Play them, I replied. Then I beat a hasty retreat.
There’s really no talking to the truly calcified singularist. Sadly, the poo-bahs of the audiophile world are some of the worst offenders. All else fades before the agenda, nothing allowed to get between the bone and its picker. Try talking audio with hardcore agenda-driven audiophiles. There will be no discussion beyond the agenda, whether that be analog vs. digital, or tubes vs. transitors, or Class A vs. Class B, or whatnot. At the very extreme end of the spectrum, audiophile zealotry can lead to the astoundingly insensitive behavior exhibited recently by a well-known audiophile writer, authority on all things LP-ish and turntable-ish.
Dr. Amar Bose passed away on July 12. Even if Dr. Amar himself isn’t familiar, his last name is known to just about everybody, given the gigantic company that he founded. Bose is the one audio name most people are likely to recognize. Bose speakers and headphones are found throughout the world. For many people, it’s a marque that’s synonymous with good sound.
For many audiophiles, Bose is everything that’s wrong with audio; they view Bose speakers and headphones as overpriced, overhyped, and underperforming. Personally I don’t agree; I’m a bonafide audiophile and the few Bose products I have owned gave good value for the money, even if their sonic virtues sometimes fell short of their marketing claims. Furthermore, I admire Bose for doing precisely what the rest of the high-end audio industry ought to be doing: taking it public, cultivating a reputation, investing in powerful public relations and advertising, and making their products not only ubiquitous but also easy to purchase. Should you wish to buy Bose, there is no going to a boutique hi-fi salon, putting in your order, then waiting two months while the shabby workshop-cum-factory digs out from under an overwhelming back order of 10 unexpected units. Nope: you can buy Bose in big-box stores or you can order right from the company’s web site. Shipping is fast, money-back guarantees are part of the deal, and build quality is consistent. In short, Bose does a hell of a lot of things right, and audiophiliac grumbles notwithstanding, the company’s success is well and truly earned.
But Dr. Bose just passed away. He was a teacher, a philanthropist, lived modestly, and left a grand legacy to his family, his employees, and to the students of MIT, not only through his teaching, but through the non-voting Bose stock he bequeathed to the university. Yet this audiophile writer used his commercially-sponsored web site to post a searing tirade against not only Dr. Bose himself but also his company. Its breathless and intemperate tone smacked of a fanatic’s hysterical gibbering in response to a trifling perceived injustice, in this case Dr. Bose’s obituary in the New York Times.
It didn’t matter whether the critic was right, wrong, or anywhere in between. What mattered was the prodigious boorishness on display. Absolutely no perspective, no sense of anything beyond his own petty and childish concerns. His might be an extreme case, but it is sadly symptomatic of today’s audiophile press, cliquish, clannish, insular, and sectarian. Such mindless partisanship over trivialities, such unreasoning tastelessness. Yet a surprising number of the comments on the writer’s rant were supportive, with only a small percentage taking the writer to task for his insensitivity. Not that it matters all that much; audiophile web sites cater to microscopic readerships. He’s screaming to a near-empty room.
Nevertheless he should be ashamed of himself. No taste, no class. I won’t be revisiting that site again and the author is henceforth on my permanent no-fly zone. And no, I will not post a link to the offending article. I prefer to keep Free Composition out of the gutter, thank you very much.