Music is supposed to reflect creativity. Music—or art in general—is supposed to be a means of expression, a means of marking time.

What could be the only thing that ruins the spirit of music?

A snob.

Now, I understand snobbery could be a byproduct of people who devote their entire lives and career to music. If you’re one of those people, I also understand that your standards start to get higher and you are always looking for something else—something better—to immerse yourself in.

But if you’re a Beatles fan, for example, and you say the movie Across the Universe is absolute garbage, that’s most uncalled for.

As cellist Yo-Yo Ma once said, “Great creativity begins with tolerance.” When a music enthusiast becomes a music snob, the tolerance is lost.

I’ll come back to the Across the Universe example. I am personally a huge Beatles fan, and you don’t even have to be a close friend of mine to figure that out. I also enjoyed Across the Universe because it was merely a tribute to the music of the Beatles—the covers weren’t supposed to replicate the band’s songs at all. The covers were done a certain way to tell a story with characters named after several Beatles songs.

Snobs go right along with purists in my book—I know several Beatles purists, and those purists were borderline enraged with the movie. They said it wasn’t done correctly, that it wasn’t the Beatles at all.

Come on. Of course it wasn’t the Beatles. Take the stick out and relax a little.

Here’s another example that comes to mind and might be more relevant to the present: Everybody has a musical guilty pleasure. Mine is trash pop—I adore Cher Lloyd.

The thing is, while I would even barely consider that art or legitimate music, it’s art to somebody. It’s probably art to the artist.

At least, I hope it’s art to the artist.

I mean, consider this: Would you consider rap music an art? There are some people who would get bent out of shape if it were considered art, let alone music. And there are others who say, “It’s hard to replicate, and it’s a talent to do that on the spot—I think it’s a legitimate art.”

Even the snobbiest of the snobs have a hard time opening their minds and considering the music of contemporary composer John Cage actual music. It could be something as absurd as an orchestra of radios or sticking screws into piano strings, but to someone—to Cage—it’s music.

Open your ears, and open your minds—tolerate someone’s music. When it comes down to it, it’s not a question of good or bad, it’s only a difference in opinion.