The other day one of my friends had the audacity to call me a musical snob. I quickly reassured her that this was not the case.

In my opinion, a music snob is someone who refuses to listen to anything outside her particular favorite genre. I think that is lame.

Why limit the kind of music you can experience because it isn’t your first choice?

Music should suit your mood, so by listening to only one kind of music, you’re basically limiting yourself to one kind of mood unless the artist has a really broad sound, which does not usually happen.

I don’t consider myself a music snob because I listen to all kinds of music, even bad music on occasion. You could call it guilty pleasure music. You N’sync fans know what I mean.

The difference between me and any other listener is akin to the difference between someone who drinks wine out of the box and someone who goes on quests from vineyard to vineyard in search of the best grapes.

I am not a musical snob. I am a musical connoisseur. The guilty pleasure music? Well, let’s just call that my shots of tequila. I have a few friends with very opinionated tastes in music, and their tastes are a reflection of who they are, which is great.

So I wondered if my musical choices reflected who I was; and of course they do, so I thought to myself, “Sure, but I must be kind of schizophrenic, because I really can’t decide on any one particular genre.”

I like it all, from hip-hop to country to pop to even classical. I just love good music. But this realization that I just love “good” music prompted an internal debate.

One side of me wants to argue that good music is truth, relevancy, a meaningful narrative, creative and, most of all, well executed.

However, that definition has serious holes in it. For instance, what about songs like that hip-hop song “Get Low” or “Grills” which, despite their lack of any true significance or creativity, have that “it factor” that demands your feet to move, your hips to shake and your lips to curl in a smile?

Sure, the production work is incredible. The layering of sounds, beats, strings and synthesizers all blend perfectly and don’t sound overplayed or cliche as with many popular rap songs. But there is no depth. Still, every time the song comes on I find myself singing along, disturbed that I even know the more-than-lewd lyrics.

Then there are artists like Janis Joplin and Bob Dylan who, despite lack of technical prowess or great voices, take us to a breaking point, capture our imagination and empower us with passion we didn’t even know we had.

On the flip side, how many songs have we all heard that are relevant and meaningful but just not powerful? I can think of a few Jack Johnson songs that are incredible lyrically, clever and well played, and even enjoyable, but musically lacking any memorable quality.

So it dawned on me. Great music, or a great song, rather, is music that 1) is memorable and 2) incites a true and lasting emotional transaction.

Because music is so diverse and so relative, I really cannot quantify or qualify what is “good” music other than to say it should be powerful, it should mean something to you and it should have an effect on your mood.

In the words of Frou Frou, “Music is worthless unless it can make a complete stranger break down and cry.”