Mark. Sorry about my "outstanding declaration", I was just born like that. Surgery hasn't helped either. I had not read your comments on the 'bluegrass thread' but I will go and do so now. The ones I have read there were very informative as indeed were all the contributions here. The reference to bluegrass was just an example.

It was interesting to read that you do change your position on the scale, depending on the subject. Unlike Bill D and I, who it seems, will always be at different end of the tennis court. 30-15 to me at the moment, I think, Bill?

But the purpose of the thread was not to argue that either extreme was the right one. But, oh what the hell….. My serve……..

I can understand the need for different types of everything but feel that there is little real danger of things becoming one large grey lump. One large, many faceted, multi-coloured and multi-cultured lump, maybe?

I believe that there always will be quite natural and clear divisions, in music anyway. More generally I think the danger comes when, in order to avoid this perceived grey lump, conscious efforts are made to design and maintain some idea of purity. For I believe that history tells us that these attempts to avoid change, to narrow, control and to some extent deny power and a say, to others are doomed to failure in the long term……….. Remember Tubby the tuba?

Is there not a forth type of person, those that can understand tennis scoring?