Marmite Music

You either like it or loath it. Marmite, that is.
Well, there's now, it seems, Marmite Music - a couple of days ago, in The Times, Karl Jenkins was described as "the Marmite man of music". Philip Clark, a composer, hates his music while Darren Healey, of Classic FM, loves it. "It's all about money," Clark claimed; "It's life-affirming," thought Henley.
I think both are wrong. I have no quarrel with Karl Jenkins if that's the sort of music he wants to write, and if he can make some moolah out of it in the process then the best of luck to him. As long as I don't have to listen to it for any length of time. It is sugary, I find, and repetitive; he does play his instantly likeable tunes over and over and, quite frankly, I get fed up with them quite quickly. Life affirming! Now that's an odd claim. He must be referring to the religious context in his various church pieces because he's no Beethoven.
Perhaps he is a bit of a Saint-Seans who thought he was writing serious music while actually he was writing easy-on-the-ear stuff. He wanted so much to be taken seriously and tried hard but I don't think he ever succeeded.
But do I care? I do not. I love a good deal of his music, especially the piano, violin and cello concertos. They are great fun. But we do have a "problem" with his 3rd. symphony, the so-called "Organ Symphony". It is fairly obvious he set out to create something special, something serious that his critics would appreciate. And it is a big work. It does have some lovely music in it. But it is so damned pretentious.
I like his "Carnival of the Animals". But he hated it and would not publish it; he played it only privately for family and friends I believe.
Perhaps he wanted to be another Beethoven.
This reminds me of what Ravel said to Gershwin when Gershwin asked if Ravel would become his tutor. "If I do," Ravel said. "You will become a second rate Ravel not, as you are, a first-rate Gershwin."