December 10, 2024

San Francisco Classical Voice had a great article about the iPod Generation
“The iPod (and, by extension, iTunes) not only revolutionized the world’s listening habits early in the last decade, expanding the sheer variety of music people listen to; it also changed the manner in which people think of and hear music. It’s true that not everyone has an iPod (or an iPhone or an MP3 player of some sort), but virtually everyone understands its significance. The device holds music that fits in your pocket, offering you an easy way to listen to vastly different things, even a way to juxtapose and to mash-up music or sounds that would normally seem as far apart as a Formula One racecar and a pony.

The most significant musical inventions from Apple’s iPod (and, by extension, iTunes) are the shuffle, the mashup, and the playlist.”

I think the author left out Music Hoarding…..I think that is a huge contribution to music. You now don’t have to look for an album in your collection, it’s there. And as your collection grows, it is invaluable to hear 20 versions of “Impressions” or “Giant Steps”. Playlists are nice, the mashup can be fun, and shuffling has its place but hoarding is where it is at. That is the wondrous thing Steve Jobs and the iPod brought us.

Thanks Steve……now lets create a playlist of a mashup of everything that has the word blues in it……ahhh, 5,568 songs? I guess we shall be using the shuffle on this…..

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