What country still has music?

Schubert:
I purchased my first real audio system from the audio club in Weisbaden. Sansui,PE,Wharfedale. You were surrounded by great audio clubs. Mainz and Rhein-Main etc.. I was stationed in Hanau and had to travel to see all the audio goodies.
Cheers

A lot of good jazz out there. A lot of great musicians who are not popular because they don't sound like the "Giants" we grew up with. The music scene will be very good once the large group of boomers, which I am part of, are gone, and they stop dictating what is good music. People will be saying, where was I while Mathew Shipp was playing in his prime, and who is this William Parker. The young players I hear on my local college station, KNTU, are good to exceptional.

Support local young musicians, and let them grow into the next Giants! Don't blow them off because they might use sounds and styles from their generations.

Acman3, you speak a great deal of wisdom. My local college has a jazz studies program that has been rated #1 in US several times by Downbeat magazine.The talent of these young musicans is amazing, the few concerts I've been to were outstanding.
If I were younger, I'd pay more attention to jazz but as a classical fan I've yet to probe all there is to Bach, Mozart, Schubert et al. If only I had another 60 years of serious listening !

A dude walks in Manhattan looking for Carnegie Hall and asks first stranger "How Do I get to the Carnegie Hall?" A stranger, who turned out to be a musician answers "Practice".

Orpheus, since I believe that Santana knows a-bit about C# or E-flat scales, It's a music.

Yes you can also start playing musical instrument without knowing the music bases, but to advance, you'd better get on to the books and teachers to preserve and prosper your talent. At least many even garage rock musicians went through the advanced music training just like Paul McCartney with Ravi Shankar. The rock musicians who could handle instrument with virtuoso reefs were often more known and popular vs. thouse who was soft and mainstream as an example.

Contrary to my statements above,

Why waste time and Why work hard when you can simply program some beat, copy a couple of notes onto the WAV file, connect it to the PA system and talk 'snit' to the microphone in front of retarded due to our financially depleted educational system urban crowd?

No need to practice. No need to advace...

Should this REALLY should dominate top 20???
Should there at least be some common sense?

It clearly doesn't matter. Do you think you'd be listening to better music if it did?