It would seem, then, that modern observers have simply given up on any renaissance of the classical era of music, and today, infomercials advise the American consumer that their three CD-set provides "All of the classical music you"ll ever need!" The United States, though, despite being younger, more heterogeneous, and with a much shorter musical history, has still produced an abundance of great symphony orchestras and solo artists, who remain popular as a result of their precise execution, versatility, and the breadth of their repertoire (Foss, Thomas & Carr 6)

             What makes music "sophisticated," then; is it the manner in which the musical elements are orchestrated, or does it involved the manner in which the music is used? Further, what makes some types of music more desirable in terms of being "nationalistic" in quality, compared to another similar piece by the same or even different composers? These issues are discussed further below. .

             The Evolution of Nationalistic Music. Clearly, the social and cultural origins of music are important considerations when assessing the relative sophistication over one type of musical composition compared to another. Ethnocentrism naturally raises its ugly head in attempting this type of subjective analysis, but the fact remains that almost all people have always created music that reflects their own unique culture and have used this music as a sort of "tribal bond." In this regard, music has been called a "universal language" because virtually all peoples have made music since time immemorial. According to Homer Ulrich (1952), "The art of music is in a certain sense analogous to a language; indeed, it has often been called a 'universal language." Two closely related possibilities of furthering the analogy may be noted: a language may be spoken with personal or regional accents, or even with different dialects; and out of its dialects new languages may be formed--somewhat in the way that the several Romance languages developed out of Latin" (Ulrich 240).