The primary ethical implication of playing music exclusively from the past is how much past music that is referenced and played is both western and white. Diversity is critical when it comes to creating art and there is so much history that is ignored throughout standard education. Only playing past music also severely limits and artistic growth. Music would not be able to evolve as it has, which would greatly hinder any further advancement. Everything would eventually just be a bunch of copies of one another.

If it were the case that I could not perform any music from the past, there are still a wide variety of songs that I could perform. My musical background is primarily in musical theatre, so there is the entire area of contemporary theatre. One of my personal favourite pieces from contemporary musical theatre is “Me and the Sky” from Come From Away. Another song that I would perform is “To Be So Lonely” by Harry Styles. The song has both an interesting melody and fun guitar line that build throughout the song.  One more song that I would play is “Call Me” by Blondie. This has been one of my favourite songs since I was a kid and I thoroughly enjoy singing and its guitar part.

To me, Nietzsche’s quote means to accurately interpret anything, you need to take into account both the present and the past. Knowledge of both of those times is crucial to development within any aspects of life. You need to take into account everything that has happened and is happening to keep progressing, or history will repeat itself.