Knowing Cavett he was probably being sarcastic and was quoting some snooty review of the fellow’s music. Cavett may have pushed the whole New York high brow act too hard but I remember him as being invariably polite and funny with his guests. He’d say something like this to get a laugh and to indicate his opinion was the opposite of the comment. In fact he wouldn’t have had Thomson on as a guest if he thought the guy was “third rate”.
I started to listen to the music and have bookmarked.
Mr. Cavett, do you find something incongruous to affect aristocratic bearing while you a public gossip-mongering boor?
For my part, I have no pretensions of wielding an aristocratic bearing.
The ONLY measure of first, second, or third rate composers (or practitioners of any “art”) is how financially successful they are at it.
If they are not selling their work (to the paying public, not to an organization that uses tax dollars to buy “art”), then their work has no value.
Have you been steaming about this for 36 years?