Mark Knows It All

There is no better representation of man’s common experience than music. I learned that lesson many years ago when I was in St. Petersburg, Russia. The Soviet Union had just collapsed, and western business entities were moving in at a rapid pace. The Hotel Europa in St. Petersburg was one of the first luxury (and extremely expensive) western hotels attempting to do business there, and my business partner and I left our standard, Russian run, affordable hotel to sneak a peek at how the other half was beginning to live in this magnificent city. It was the week before Christmas. St. Petersburg is dark 20 hours/day and very cold that time of year. In the lounge of the hotel, a Russian lounge piano dude was attempting to play Christmas music. Living in an atheistic society for all of his life, it was clear he had no knowledge of western Christmas music, and my partner and I kind of laughed as he struggled through some tunes that sounded vaguely familiar but off the mark. He looked at us and