So how do you listen to music?

Dear Erik,

This is a much bigger question than the obvious answer! Of course the answer is not the same for me as a 44 year old as it was when I was first introduced to the Great C Major Symphony of Schubert in 1971 either.

Please forgive a delay, while I work out an answer! Indeed, I think it certain that I can only part work this out for myself, and hope when I give a real attempt at an answer, a discussion will follow, which will clarify my own thoughts.

Really, I have never even considered it. Listening to music, with utter concentration, seems as natural and inevtable as a lamb suckling within minutes of being born, for me!

ATB from Fredrik

Truth be told, nowadays it's mainly in the car with the windows down and bemoaning the fact that it doesn't go loud enough for the bass to break up the concrete.
I used to mainly listen to reggae and drum and bass singles, jumping around the room to them. Home circumstances have changed so that now I mainly listen to ambient music through headphones, slumped in a chair and reading a book. It's crap being old and responsible.

quote:

Originally posted by erik scothron:
Following on from a digression on another thread in the HiFi room (CD players...sonically the same?)I would like to ask how members here actually listen to music. How do you set about having a serious listening binge and what do you focus on? If you have a new recording do you read the programme notes first, after or not at all? Do you focus on certain instruments and follow them for awhile before swapping to others? Do you imagine yourself conducting (come on own up and admit it). Asking how you listen to music may seem like a daft question but I anticipate some interesting answers.

It's an interesting question actually. I have at least two 'listening' modes. The first is just to slap a record on the turntable, or a CD into the CDP, and listen more or less casually, maybe reading and only taking in the music occasionally. Other times, I'll take some time to choose a piece, read the programme notes, and probably listen through headphones to aid concentration.

I should add that I'm a total ignoramus when it comes to classical music, of the 'I don't know much about music but I know what I like' persuasion, and often find the programme notes incomprehensible!

Dear Erik,

Maybe this is no answer, and I cannot explain it, but I listen with every physical fibre of my being, and all of my soul as well. For a while nothing else matters!

Sorry for that all too blunt explanation. Fredrik

Dear Erik!
Good evening!
The first thing that i do, when i get new cds, is putting them in the player.
Any time of the day, doesn't matter.
I take them on the sofa and listen to them with those i already know.
Some goes in the shelfs, some on the carpet and some stay on the sofa.
The best are driven to my good friend's house for a "deeper test"!

There're records i've listened only one time, others that i do listen to only during winter or summer.
Now that you make me think about it....................i don't know..........
They become a part of my life.......................that's all.

Beyond words my dear Gianluigi! Truth to tell, and I have tried to work it out, but know I cannot...

All the best to you, from Fredrik

Hi Fred!
Hope you're good!
I have records that did follow me in the years and we became indivisible.
I don't live music as an external fact, but music can even make me change my spirits.
Am i going definitively crazy?

quote:

Am i going definitively crazy?

If you think you're crazy, you're probably not. (see Catch 22 passim).

Dear Gianluigi,

There is a bit of madness in all of us, I would guess, at least knowing me and a few good friends. Knowing this madness is the important thing! The people that worry me are the real lunatics, who proclaim their complete sanity. They are the dangerous ones! Fred

quote:

Originally posted by Fredrik_Fiske:
The people that worry me are the real lunatics, who proclaim their complete sanity. They are the dangerous ones!

Yes Fred!
You're right!

quote:

Originally posted by JoeH:
(see Catch 22 passim).

Sorry but.......what?

Erik,

For me it depends. Sometimes I'll read the programme notes (and occasionally, and this is very occasionally, since I'm only able to do it with Mahler one and two, I'll even follow along with the score). Other times I just site back and listen.

You talk about focusing on some instruments - I often do, but it is often not the same ones as it was the last time - this is one of the joys of listening to orchestral music, there is always something a little different to hear each time you listen, even with old and much loved recordings.

As far as armchair conducting, a recording does sometimes tempt me in that direction (particularly with exciting recordings), though I don't suppose what I do with my arms would mean anything terribly useful to an orchestra.

And sometimes (and I know this will disappoint Fredrik!), I even listen while I'm doing other things, such as typing on the computer or even reading (though I'm not sure I'd term that serious listening as you mentioned at the outset).

regards, Tam

What I've never understood is why I just don't enjoy opera when it's on TV and yet listening to the same opera on Radio 3 or CD or, better still, at a theatre or concert hall is highly enjoyable.

I suppose I don't really see the need for MTV style video either - I'd sooner just listen to the song. But Opera is a visual event, so why do I enjoy it more on Radio than TV?

I think it is very difficult to explain how I listen to music - enjoyment is important, I'd find it difficult to listen as an academic exercise. However, understanding more about the music does help enhance my enjoyment.

Rotf

quote:

Originally posted by ROTF:
What I've never understood is why I just don't enjoy opera when it's on TV and yet listening to the same opera on Radio 3 or CD or, better still, at a theatre or concert hall is highly enjoyable.

This is interesting, and to an extent I agree. For example, when BBC two broadcast the ROH Figaro the other day I tuned in for a while but it didn't grip me at all, ditto the Levine Ring on DVD. On the other hand, the semi-staged Mackerras Pinafore from last summer's proms, was absolutely engrossing as, so far, has been the Boulez Ring.

That said, opera on CD or in any medium in the home, is never going to match the theatre. I am sure the problem is more acute with opera than with orchestral music because of the visual elements (I was going to say 'dramatic' too, but I think a lot of other music has that, so it would have been silly).

Why then, however, should you enjoy the Radio 3 or a CD? Often, the opera on Radio 3 is live, so perhaps that adds something. I suspect another answer might be in the TV. My father refuses to watch opera DVD and videos on the grounds that the small picture (in comparison to the spectacle in the theatre) is just never going to do it justice and never going to capture adequately the scale of things. What is worse, one has to look where the director thought you ought to be looking. On CD/Radio, there's no pretence that you're only getting one aspect of the thing and I suspect because you are expecting less, it is, oddly, more satisfying.

regards, Tam

Radio is magic on whatever area. Music Spoken word, Plays, Opera. I don't miss the TV, and I can understand what is being written on Radio Opera. Yes it is gripping, but the few I have seen in the Theatre were a completely different and more entertaining event! I am not sure it is the same as music listening though as the visual element (either stage or imagined to some extent) takes attention from the musical attention. I tend to listen at concerts with my eyes shut...

Fredrik

quote:

Originally posted by Gianluigi Mazzorana:
Dear Erik!
Good evening!
The first thing that i do, when i get new cds, is putting them in the player.
Any time of the day, doesn't matter.
I take them on the sofa and listen to them with those i already know.
Some goes in the shelfs, some on the carpet and some stay on the sofa.
The best are driven to my good friend's house for a "deeper test"!

There're records i've listened only one time, others that i do listen to only during winter or summer.
Now that you make me think about it....................i don't know..........
They become a part of my life.......................that's all.

Ciao Gianluigi,

I tend to be very cautious (perhaps too cautious) about the music I buy so I rarely end up with something I would only listen to once. I tend to flog a new recording to death with repeated listening and then I wonder where the excitement I got upon first listening disapeared to. I think I got into this silly habit because money was so short when I first started collecting (like Fredrik I was only 9 when I bought my first record - Jussi Bjorling Opera arias.)

I can listen to the same piece over and over and I wish I had the discipline not to this.

These days I always read the programme notes first so I know what to look out for. In days gone by I would tell you that I knew a piece of music note for note but without really understanding what was going on because I rarely ever read the notes. Now having read the notes on a few old favourites I think I 'know' the pieces much better.

Ciao,

Erik

Listening to me is about awareness and this awareness can be developed, it is trainable. The more I develop/refine this awareness the more I find of value(to me)in classical music and less I find of value in pop/rock etc which comes across as being 2 dimensional and gimmicky.

I think Fredrik has this awareness in abundence and it comes from an inate natural predispostion to listen to classical music in a totally focussed manner. This awareness starts from the ability to focus on the music to the exclusion of all else. Couple this with the awareness that studying the score brings, coupled with the awareness that being a musician brings, coupled with the awareness of one who has performed live music in a variety of different venues and and it becomes clear that what Fredrik experiences whilst listening to music is not what I experience. The music is the same on one level but the experience is different to the degree that the music actually appears to be different and is different(which is to be expected IMO as the music does not exist separate to the listener).

Sometimes I like to be quite passive and let the music just wash over me, other times I like to follow a particular instrument or group of instruments, sometimes I like to imagine myself 'mentally conducting' (without a score)to force myself to prepare for what is coming and this is a good exercise in memory. When watching live I too like to close my eyes sometimes (even at an opera)and other times I like to watch the orchestra to see who is active and to hear/see the effect that the different elements have on the whole.

More later perhaps.

Erik

Ciao Erik!
Yes!
Maybe you have a more rational "relationship" with music.
Of course this is not a criticism.
My approach to music is more "physical" and has not order.
I mean that i consider music like a kind of food where i don't want to know the engredients but i let the entire flawor bring me.
Sometimes i do taste and i do open and read the books or the leaflets.
Sometimes i do fill my mouth and let my senses bring the wheel.

Sometimes "food" is too sweet or too bitter and i leave it for a better moment in which i can face it in all its components.
Sometimes is only simple goog bread and i let my teeth crunch it!

quote:

Originally posted by Gianluigi Mazzorana:

quote:

Originally posted by JoeH:
(see Catch 22 passim).

Sorry but.......what?

From Catch 22 by Joseph Heller:

Yossarian looked at him soberly and tried another approach.
"Is Orr crazy?"

"He sure is," Doc Daneeka said.

"Can you ground him?"

"I sure can but first he has to ask me to. That's part of the rule."

"Then why doesn't he ask you to?"

"Because he's crazy," Doc Daneeka said. "He has to be crazy to keep flying combat missions after all the close calls he's had. Sure I can ground Orr. But first he has to ask me to."

"That's all he has to do to be grounded?"

"That's all. Let him ask me."

"And then you can ground him?" Yossarian asked.

"No, then I can't ground him."

"You mean there's a catch?"

"Sure there is a catch," Doc Daneeka replied. "Catch-22. Anyone who wants to get out of combat duty isn't really crazy."

Sometimes if I am lucky whilst pursuing other activities e.g. living/trotting in country-through city someone plays something-I feel music.

Usually I plonk myself in auditorium or in my/someone else's lounge and listen intently. This is often very nice.

Frequently however from someone's window etc etc I can hear nice recorded sounds and sometimes I stop to enjoy, much as when one hears good busking.

I am convinced that overpriced audio boxes are not required thank goodness to enjoy music.