OLDEN GOLDIES

“Our elders . . . don’t like it much when you remind them that a Paul Simon CD in 1993 is not dissimilar from a Jo Stafford record in the Summer of Love . . . not a bad purchase, exactly, but irrelevant to the scheme of things.”

What a ridiculous statement! It is the kind of hopelessly naive juvenile prattle we older “dudes” (I’m 53) love to rub in the faces of silly whippersnappers like Gold.

This columnist obviously has no sense of musical history. Stafford peaked in the 1940s, so to buy one of her records in the Summer of Love, which I happened to have lived through, was an act of nostalgia. Simon has survived as more than nostalgia by being an articulate and sensitive poet whose latest two endeavors interpolated South African and Brazilian elements to great critical and commercial success. Irrelevant to whose scheme of things?

Stafford, by the way, had a song called “Haunted Heart,” which appeared on a CD this year, nominated for a Grammy, which tends to verify her contribution to the musical scheme of things.

FRANK GIORDANO

Los Angeles