I'm the other side of the coin, Jay. Although I was into music back when the Band was playing, I was never that into the music. I knew of the groups, and even knew some of the folks within the groups (Lani Hall in Sergio Mendes' Brasil '66 for one . . . . .

). Not being a professional musician, I just never got into it all that much. Until I grew up, kind of.
Most of the music I listen to is Western stuff. Not Country and Western, I rarely listen to anything out of Nashville. I'm talking Ian Tyson, Brenn Hill, Joni Harms, RW Hampton, and so on, real cowboy stuff. Oddly enough, as the Country industry (there's what used to be a real oxymoron for you) has moved to pop-rock void, the Western artists have stepped into (actually, never left) the folk field. Ian Tyson, for one, got his start in NYC with, of all people, Bob Dylan who started out in folk and went pop/rock. Ol' Ian met up with a cute young lady name of Sylvia Fricker, and thus Ian and Sylvia were born.
This is the music world I knew - as an observer only.With Levon's passing, I have looked more closely at The Band - I remembered The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down - a group I had ignored cuz after all, they backed Bob Dylan.

The more I've looked recently, the more I see the genius in that group. Levon was one of a kind, no doubt, and he did things his way, right to the end, even the form of his cancer treatment, how it all but destroyed his vocal cords, and how he won 2 Grammies for his singing work after that treatment.
Levon, RIP. I wish I knew you better when you were still around.