High brow or low brow?

My grandparents lived in Cwmtillery, coal miners.

Sincere apologies ! I can't pronounce that place that begins with a y and I call bargoed, ystrid monach or something!

@Jeni - it's "Cwm Rhonda" - Cwm (like 'Coombe') meaning valley.

Isn't middle brow a term? Couldn't we all be that? Or is that a bit boring?

Welsh men singing cum Rhonda!

I too was wondering petallus who decides what is high or low brow and agree with Annobel that we should enjoy what we enjoy without being judged!

My husband loves Modern Jazz but I love Country Music. The reason for our difference is, I think, that I love the story in songs and he likes the intricacies of (very peculiar!!) modern jazz!

Are either of us high brow or low brow? Or beyond the pale!

High brow vs low brow? This is the 21st Century - we mix and match. I love Mozart but enjoy Country and Western and Queen; like Trollope, George Elliot, Jane Austen, Ian McEwan; get absorbed in Marian Keyes and the late lamented Maeve Binchy.

Yay, somebody else who likes Welsh male voice choir!

I am wondering whether it could be seen as just a little arrogant to be ABSOLUTELY sure that modern art is a con.

As I remarked earlier I went to a Tracy Emin exhibition in London earlier in the year and found it very moving.

Damien Hirst? Interesting but didn't do a lot for me.

I meant to put the copied but in italics but it didn't work.

Greatnan said:
^Laurence Olivier considered Coronation Street to be a wonderful piece of theatre and never missed it. It has nurtured some great actors, especially child actors. It has tackled very difficult subjects with sensitivity. I love it.

I have very broad tastes in music, anything from 1950's Rock and Roll, through Brass Bands, Welsh Male Voice Choirs, Gregorian Plain Song, African folk music, sentimental love songs, =jazz-, blues, and classical. I find most opera boring, as there is so much run-of-the-mill stuff between the great arias, so I buy compilations. I enjoy ballet music.

I like Shakespeare and modern dramatists like Miller and Pinter but still enjoy Rattigan and Priestley. I had a very boring night and a numb backside by watching a Greek tragedy at The Barbican. I can't stand plays or films where anything supernatural can intervene in the action.

I love courtroom dramas, like Kavanagh Q.C. (I miss John That, in that and Morse).
I am pretty high brow with literature, which I studied for my degree, and I really love Austen, Elliot, Trollope, Waugh, Golding, and Lessing. I don't like Dickens or the Brontes -I find them too overblown. I don't read 'chick-lit'.
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I don't watch films with violence in them, and some war films upset me because I know they are close to the truth. I like some musicals and romantic comedies. Very low brow.

In art, I think there is a touch of the Emperor's New Clothes about much art appreciation. I love the impressionists - Musee Quai D'Orsay has a wonderful collection, and it is cheaper than the Louvre , with less waiting time. Most modern art is a con - especially Damien Hurst and Tracy Emin.

I am too old to pretend to like anything because it is fashionable or deemed to be high brow.^

I've copied the post because it eerily echos my own feelings, so much that when I read it at first I thought it was an old post of mine! Don't like modern jazz though.

I love corrie. I also love chopin. I paint my toenails too!!

While I was teaching a module on Soaps and Society in my Access Media Studies course, I watched most of the soaps, except for Emmerdale. My favourite was Brookside - a big body count, including the one under the patio, but a lot of humour as well. I was glad not to have to watch East Enders any more - nothing good ever happens in that - and now I have given upon Corrie. What do I do instead? Gransnet, of course!

I used to watch all the soaps.
Now I have a life

But goose Enid Blyton had such fabulous stories as opposed to ITV which had Chris Tarrant and Timmy Mallet! Mind you, the children's school advised against letting them watch 'Grange Hill' in case it gave them ideas!!

kittylester - that brought back memories as I wasn't allowed to watch ITV or read Enid Blyton as my dad ( a teacher thinks it did/does not stretch your vocabulary)

Didn't you like the Battersbys then feetlebaum? I agree Les was a bit much sometimes but I thought Janice did her best by the girls.

They're long gone now.

I've watched Corrie since Ken Barlow was a young student. Some excellent drama sometimes, good script, convincing acting.

Sometimes exasperatingly silly and on those occasions I fast forward through the unbearable bits.

I watched Coronation Street from its beginnings right up until -- the Battersbys. That was my cue to jump ship... a pity, because it had had such warmth and recognisable humanity, and some very fine playing and writing... but it all seems to have gone - rather like the Archers on radio which just seems to irritate poeple nowadays.

on the other hand I sat through episode one of Eastenders, hated it, and haven't watched it since.

Popular music? Had to play it to earn my living at one time... it wasn't great then, but seems to be utterly moronic now -- although I suppose there are exceptions at any time.

If pushed, she probably referred to it as 'the little girls' room'

Bucket more useful in that context.

Sorry Bucket. No, she prefers Bouquet.

Hyacinth bucket would never admit to even using such a facility, let alone calling it anything at all.

Just what I was trying to think of Jeni. I think that the definition starts with whether you call a WC a lavatory or a toilet. Opting for loo is apparently OK.

Must admit that I have trouble reaching my toes to paint them these days but would never dream of having them done for me. That would really be too self-indulgent. Self-indulgent, moi? Finger nails .....well, that's another matter.

Don't like the word posh. Never have especially since I was once compared (by children I hasten to add) to Margot in The Good Life - ouch!!! However, our road is rather posh and it is considered decidedly common to let one's kids play football in the street. Common? No but definitely annoying as footballs are kicked forcibly against walls and it gets worse as you get older I find . The gentle throb of lawn mowers is currently annoying me as I type this on the patio on a strangely sunny Sunday but at least my husband will be revving up his mower soon. Revenge is sweet - lol. Funny how our own mower is not as annoying as other people's.

Must have taken the 'common' article too seriously so I'm not going there or am I? No. But I can discuss something called gross and that brings to mind an exceedingly large breasted and overweight American girl at Heathrow Airport yesterday. Well, they were falling about unsupported all over the place out of a very low cut top and then she started discussing them loudly with her straight-faced, under-endowed travelling companion. Yuk! The hot weather certainly brings out a lot that might be best kept out of view.

Sorry not to contribute much but when I do I tend to go on too much

My tastes are catholic in every art form
Books, music, art,theatre if the review sounds interesting I'll read it,listen to it,admire it or watch what ever I like. I'm open to new experiences all the time.

U and non U