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ANNA DEAVERE SMITH:
I was wondering, SHERYL, what you would think about Billie Holiday as a
person who would interpret a...
SHERYL CROW:
See, I was, I think if you put Frank Sinatra...
ANNA DEAVERE SMITH:
....songs of another genre, and gave it her own sort of spin.
SHERYL CROW:
I was just going ready to say, if you, if you, if you look at Frank
Sinatra and you're looking at him as somebody who really impacted,
impacted the mainstream but did not make any great innovating changes in
music, you, you almost have to look at Billie Holiday as one of the
greatest interpreters of all time, if you're looking at music as
story telling, and addressing love and relationship issues, you have to
look at Billie Holiday. Because, for me, she's one of the most
incredible...
ROB REINER:
For me, the greatest jazz singer of all time...
SHERYL CROW:
And Ella Fitzgerald.
ROB REINER:
....is Ella Fitzgerald. I would say the greatest jazz singer of all
time is Ella Fitzgerald, and, then you also have to think about people
like Al Joleson.
SHERYL CROW:
Yeah.
ROB REINER:
I mean, he was in this century. Al Joleson, and George M. Cohan. And
these are people who had an enormous influence on, on, on music, and
theater, and, you know, it's impossible. It's...
SHERYL CROW:
You get into writers, you get into Cole Porter, and you...(Overlapping
voices).
CHARLIE ROSE:
Anybody have an idea, from the audience, what we're missing on in terms
of the world of music?
CHARLIE ROSE:
The Beatles! All right, let's talk about the Beatles.
ROB REINER:
I mentioned the Beatles, but they were in passing. (Overlapping voices)
I was going to, put the Beatles as composers, Lennon and McCartney.
CHARLIE ROSE:
Yeah.
ROB REINER:
As composers, because, yes, obviously the group, the Beatles, had a
tremendous impact on the culture, but they didn't invent rock 'n' roll,
certainly.
SHERYL CROW:
But, if you're talking about innovators, you're talking about a band,
putting their chemistry aside, and what they, how they overtook the
mainstream, and changed music, you have to look at, even technically,
the way they recorded on a four-track, and the way they
progressed, and they way they experimented, and it changes...
ROB REINER:
Then you could say George Martin, then. Because he had a lot of...
SHERYL CROW:
But John Lennon and Paul McCartney were definitely, also, really,
certainly he should be thrown in there, but, they changed the way record
making...
ROB REINER:
But as song writers, you have to definitely include them as all-time...
CHARLIE ROSE:
What did we say about Gershwin, and people like that,
who...?
ROB REINER:
Right, invented, geniuses.
SHERYL CROW:
All those (Overlapping voices)
ROBERT HUGHES:
Geniuses.
ANNA DEAVERE SMITH:
Leonard Bernstein, somebody said..
SHERYL CROW:
Leonard Bernstein...
AUDIENCE MEMBER The Rolling Stones.
CHARLIE ROSE:
The Rolling Stones.
ROB REINER:
Great rock 'n' roll band.
CHARLIE ROSE:
A great band. (Overlapping voices)
ROB REINER:
Best rock 'n' roll band of the century.
SHERYL CROW:
Yeah.
ROBERT HUGHES:
Let's hear it for Stravinsky again. Stravinsky again.
(LAUGHTER)
ROBERT HUGHES:
I'm sorry, I don't want to sound like some peeling pseudo-intellectual,
but I really...(Overlapping voices).
CHARLIE ROSE:
Robert, no one will ever call you a pseudo-intellectual.
(LAUGHTER)
ANNA DEAVERE SMITH:
We are tending, now, as we're talking about music, to be talking about
our own time, so...
ROB REINER:
Yes. We have more of a connection with our own time than we do, I mean,
we can look at political leaders, and make determinations, not in our
own time, but it's hard to talk about the impact on culture, when you
weren't in that time period, you know what I'm saying?
ANNA DEAVERE SMITH:
It's also that we're in this....
ROB REINER:
You could talk about the art of, you can't talk about the impact on
culture.
SHERYL CROW:
Well...
ANNA DEAVERE SMITH:
We're also an incredible, we're in an amazing technological
moment, and I, in a way, I wonder if we can really separate art from
technology in that way, if the work of the artist is to reach the hearts
of millions, something has happened, in the fact that so many more,
we have the equipment to reach so more people.
ROBERT HUGHES:
Suppose the work of the artist is not to reach the hearts of millions?
ANNA DEAVERE SMITH:
Uh, that would be...
ROBERT HUGHES:
But rather to make something as perfectly as he or she can, his
qualities will be...
ANNA DEAVERE SMITH:
What if it reaches the hearts of millions in spite of that?
ROBERT HUGHES:
Great if it does.
ANNA DEAVERE SMITH:
Great if it does.
ROBERT HUGHES:
Great if it does, yeah.
CHARLIE ROSE:
But I would assume you would not define the work of the artist to reach
the hearts of millions, but to reach perfection as best he or she can.
ROBERT HUGHES:
That's my tendency, yeah.
CHARLIE ROSE:
Your tendency, yes. Yes.
ROB REINER:
Reach perfection? You think about that?
ROBERT HUGHES:
To get as good as you can within the limits of your own medium.
ROBERT HUGHES:
To push the envelope within that medium, to...
ROB REINER:
I think the artist, I mean, I don't know, I think the artist is somebody
who tries to get in touch with some part of themselves, and
represent it as honestly as possible, and thereby make some kind of
statement about the human condition, or...
ROBERT HUGHES:
Yes.
SHERYL CROW:
I don't think Bob Dylan sat down to make something perfect.
ROB REINER:
No, no. Not about perfection, it's about... (Overlapping voices).
CHARLIE ROSE:
Well, what do you think Bob Dylan set down to do?
ROB REINER:
...perfecting to something in your soul, uh, that's honest.
SHERYL CROW:
I think it was, he was a commentator. He looked at something, he
couldn't help it, he sat down and wrote about it. You know, he, that's
the way it came out, it was this, is was expression, it was
communication.