The Great Stuff Like many of you, I commute between Portland and Cumberland every day, only mine is a reverse commute: from the city to the bucolic suburb. Depending on traffic (almost always tricky trying to get out of Portland) , the ride is usually 30 – 35 minutes, which makes it the perfect length of time to listen to one lesson of The Great Courses.  Do you know about the Teaching Company’s Great Courses?  You should.   The brainchild of Tom Rollins, former chief counsel and chief of staff to Senator Ted Kennedy’s Labor and Human Services Committee, The Teaching Company was launched in 1989 in an effort to bring the Western canon of great literature, philosophy, and art out of the ivory towers and to, if not the unwashed masses, the group of folks Rollins called “life-long learners”, the autodidacts, the hungry minds.  Rollins idea – and the key to his eventual success – was tapping into the best and brightest University professors and giving them carte blanche to go as deep, as long, as lovely as they wanted.   After a touch-and-go decade, the Teaching Company hit its stride and by the new millennia was reporting $20 million in sales.  Today they offer a subscription streaming service on over 280 topics. The courses now range broadly in content area and while the Canon is still the critical base, it now extends into non-Western histories, cultures, music, and how-to series. Seriously, there is something for everyone. The course are not inexpensive (except for the annual sale, which is phenomenal) but they are worth every penny (and like books, make excellent gifts for all occasions).   Here at PML we are building on our Great Courses holdings. A recent acquisition is a course in music delivered by Professor Robert Greenberg, who teaches at UC Berkeley and is himself a composer and musicologist.  Greenberg’s mastery of subject is matched by his quick and engaging style and his fantastic sense of humor. For once in my life, I wish my commute were just a little longer – I tend to listen to each tape (there are 40 in this one) twice – the first time to learn, the second to savor.   I have learned more about music in this series than I’ve ever known – well beyond knowing what I like – with regard to time period, expression, and form.  I agree with Greenberg that music is the universal language and  teaches us about our world, our history, ourselves.  This series is simply brilliant – the only caveat is that the stuff playing on the radio or your device might sound a little tinny and thin after spending time with the greats (Bach, Haydn, Mozart, etc.)