I have been listening to music for as long as I can recall. When I was a child I would spend hours sitting in front of the radio listening to songs from radio stations both near and far. My love for music began when I was very young, and my tastes have always been varied.

In spite of embracing a wide variety of listening genres, one style of music that has always endured in my mind, is classical. Growing up in the Salinas valley of California, my first exposure to classical music was with a station from Monterey. The station then known as KWAV, hosted a nightly program called the Master's Concert. It featured classical pieces from all the great composers. For whatever reason, it had a lasting impression on me. I would sit in the living room many nights and listen to music from the Baroque, Classical, or Romantic eras. Rather unusual for an eleven year old boy, but not unheard of. That radio station was responsible for giving me my foundation for a lifetime of appreciation of classical music.

When I speak about appreciation of classical music, I think of two particular areas. First and foremost, I appreciate classical music as an art form. Classical musicians, many of whom are quite young, spend hours each week honing their skills. It is imperative that they are top notch musicians if they expect to tour on any of the classical circuits. Their dedication is unbelievable, and the music they produce is spectacular. And not only does it sound incredible, but classical music has the capacity to soothe the nerves of even the most frazzled person. It is music for the soul.

The second area that I consider so special with regard to classical music, is the history that it gives us. So many great composers have passed through the classical genre, and yet their music is not forgotten and continues to live on centuries later. Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, Bach, and Rachmaninoff are just a few of the stars who have given so much to this style of music, and yet they are only a speck of sand on the beach of classical music. There are many more grains of sand in this genre that are too countless to be named, and each has created his or her own unique place in classical history. These composers all shared one common bond. They each shared a love and dedication to music and a love for the art itself.

I do admit that it bothers me that classical music loses it's attraction with the younger audience. This is not to say that young people don't enjoy classical

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