Commercials Won Out Over Classics Letter Of The Week From Feb. 16

I was extremely disappointed when, watching the opening ceremonies of the Olympics, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony was interrupted for a string of commercials.

I had eagerly anticipated the chance to see this wonderful work performed by choirs on five continents, connected via satellite, with conductor Seiji Ozawa, a renowned orchestra and a choir of 2,000 people in the Nagano stadium. It was a very symbolic event, bringing together choirs from all over the world.

But this was all summarily cut off and ignored in favor of the almighty dollar. I was unable to believe the lack of respect the network gave to the Japanese effort to put this together and to this beautiful piece of music.

As a student of music, I was naturally excited to hear and see this performance. Also, having just finished studying the communist and apartheid systems in school, I realized what a truly amazing thing it was that communists in Beijing would be singing with people from Vienna; that in formerly apartheid South Africa, whites and black would be singing together. This was something that brought the world closer together - and television viewers in America were not given the opportunity to witness it. Instead, we were shown another example of the crass commercialism in our society.

What kind of example for young people are adults setting when decisions such as this are made? Lydia Newell, age 15 Spokane

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