Disposiition of the Listener
Posted by: mikeeschman on 08 May 2010
Everyone who pursues listening to music has some basic bias that colors everything they do in this regard.
For me, it is a single preference.
That they tell a story. I think music analogous to the short story and the novel.
There is much great music that is not like that. For me, the ones that do fit like a glove. The others take more work.
How about you?
For me, it is a single preference.
That they tell a story. I think music analogous to the short story and the novel.
There is much great music that is not like that. For me, the ones that do fit like a glove. The others take more work.
How about you?
Posted on: 09 May 2010 by u5227470736789439
My disposition is very simple.
From the age of eight [40 years ago!], on discovering the music of JS Bach without any help, having fixed up a broken miniature transistor radio, I began a wide range of discovery via Radio Three of everything from Monteverdi to Stockhausen.
At nine I was sent to boarding school where the weekly musical appreciation lesson - being the last lesson of Saturday morning, attended by all but the First Form [for 7/8 year olds] - was my relief from a non-too-happy existence, at first, away from the comforts of home.
This introduced me systematically to the Viennese Classics, though not, as it happened, Bach, of whose music our music master was not enthusiastic. I was also shown the elements of music form, and score reading, and ultimately musical analysis. For five years my musical discoveries were made with a firm guiding hand, and non-the-worse for that, though once freed of this strict regimen, I set off on the moderns, and the baroques with equal abandon. In those days Radio Three was not nearly so populist as it has become, so that some very difficult to grasp music from the 20th Century was there for the listening every week.
But it was becoming clear to me that my real favourites were Bach and Haydn! This has never changed, but it does not rule out the romantics, or to some extent the moderns, but most of all, I discovered over thirty years the wonders of the great baroques as well.
As for analysis, I have almost never bothered with it since school days, though so clear are the forms in the classics that is very easy even from the second listening to clearly understand which is for example, the first subject group, and the second, and where the development [free fantasy in the USA] beings and where the recapitulations starts again, and then the coda - in sonata form of course. Playing helped me do this sort of simplified, on-the-fly-style, of analysis for sure. This a quite player-oriented perspective on analysis ...
Very much into the second half of my life, I am much happier building on the repertoire of music I love from a relatively small group of composers, rather than fly off to others, visited and long since consigned to my personal second rank of enjoyment and affection. For me music is all about enjoyment, affection for it, and most all being transported into a world lacking the cares of daily life - a trance-like meditative form of escapism if you like. Nothing else beyond this! For me it is not an intellectual thing, unlike reading history, or understanding current events ...
When I know well all Haydn's Quartets and Trios, then I will bee looking for another mine so deep, of great chamber music. This is not to say that I would enjoy the Haydn on a concert programme, and not enjoy the Faure or Tavenner, which might share the bill!
But it seems that for deep study and repeated [and ever deeper listening] the old masters have the greatest rewards to offer for me!
Given the time, I would rather spend it listening to music new to me from composers with the highest hit-rate of music that becomes deeply beloved!
If I go on holiday, I am craving music within 48 hours, if I am in a place where there is none!
I sometimes dread the idea of going away on holiday, if I know there is no music about!
ATB from George
From the age of eight [40 years ago!], on discovering the music of JS Bach without any help, having fixed up a broken miniature transistor radio, I began a wide range of discovery via Radio Three of everything from Monteverdi to Stockhausen.
At nine I was sent to boarding school where the weekly musical appreciation lesson - being the last lesson of Saturday morning, attended by all but the First Form [for 7/8 year olds] - was my relief from a non-too-happy existence, at first, away from the comforts of home.
This introduced me systematically to the Viennese Classics, though not, as it happened, Bach, of whose music our music master was not enthusiastic. I was also shown the elements of music form, and score reading, and ultimately musical analysis. For five years my musical discoveries were made with a firm guiding hand, and non-the-worse for that, though once freed of this strict regimen, I set off on the moderns, and the baroques with equal abandon. In those days Radio Three was not nearly so populist as it has become, so that some very difficult to grasp music from the 20th Century was there for the listening every week.
But it was becoming clear to me that my real favourites were Bach and Haydn! This has never changed, but it does not rule out the romantics, or to some extent the moderns, but most of all, I discovered over thirty years the wonders of the great baroques as well.
As for analysis, I have almost never bothered with it since school days, though so clear are the forms in the classics that is very easy even from the second listening to clearly understand which is for example, the first subject group, and the second, and where the development [free fantasy in the USA] beings and where the recapitulations starts again, and then the coda - in sonata form of course. Playing helped me do this sort of simplified, on-the-fly-style, of analysis for sure. This a quite player-oriented perspective on analysis ...
Very much into the second half of my life, I am much happier building on the repertoire of music I love from a relatively small group of composers, rather than fly off to others, visited and long since consigned to my personal second rank of enjoyment and affection. For me music is all about enjoyment, affection for it, and most all being transported into a world lacking the cares of daily life - a trance-like meditative form of escapism if you like. Nothing else beyond this! For me it is not an intellectual thing, unlike reading history, or understanding current events ...
When I know well all Haydn's Quartets and Trios, then I will bee looking for another mine so deep, of great chamber music. This is not to say that I would enjoy the Haydn on a concert programme, and not enjoy the Faure or Tavenner, which might share the bill!
But it seems that for deep study and repeated [and ever deeper listening] the old masters have the greatest rewards to offer for me!
Given the time, I would rather spend it listening to music new to me from composers with the highest hit-rate of music that becomes deeply beloved!
If I go on holiday, I am craving music within 48 hours, if I am in a place where there is none!
I sometimes dread the idea of going away on holiday, if I know there is no music about!
ATB from George
Posted on: 09 May 2010 by pe-zulu
Dear George
Thanks for this thoughtful post, which I enjoyed very much to read. I recognize much from my own life, but would never be able to put it that well.
ATB,
Thanks for this thoughtful post, which I enjoyed very much to read. I recognize much from my own life, but would never be able to put it that well.
ATB,
Posted on: 09 May 2010 by Naijeru
There are several ways in which I appreciate music, as my tastes are rather eclectic.
Music must do one or more of the following things:
Be revealing; I love music that teaches me something about life or myself I hadn't considered.
Be tasteful; I look to music for information about which sounds go well together.
Create a soundscape; music that transports me to a landscape defined by its sound is particularly thrilling.
Be challenging (aka novel); I relish discovering patterns in avante garde experimental music or hearing a new sound.
Be danceable; the fundamental truth of all music. I have heard performers both great and small fail at this feat, which is unforgivable when a piece calls for it. The listener is robbed of an opportunity to engage the music in a way that can deepen one's relationship to it. Sure, not all music is meant for play at the Roxy, but to lack an underlying rhythmic structure such that I'm not inspired to snap my fingers, bob my head, tap my toes, air conduct or otherwise be physically engaged with the music is to be worthless music imo.
Music must do one or more of the following things:
Be revealing; I love music that teaches me something about life or myself I hadn't considered.
Be tasteful; I look to music for information about which sounds go well together.
Create a soundscape; music that transports me to a landscape defined by its sound is particularly thrilling.
Be challenging (aka novel); I relish discovering patterns in avante garde experimental music or hearing a new sound.
Be danceable; the fundamental truth of all music. I have heard performers both great and small fail at this feat, which is unforgivable when a piece calls for it. The listener is robbed of an opportunity to engage the music in a way that can deepen one's relationship to it. Sure, not all music is meant for play at the Roxy, but to lack an underlying rhythmic structure such that I'm not inspired to snap my fingers, bob my head, tap my toes, air conduct or otherwise be physically engaged with the music is to be worthless music imo.