[Smt-talk] the impossibility of listening

[Olli Väisälä]

Daniel Roca wrote

>
> El 02/11/2012, a las 10:04, Nicolas Meeùs escribió:
>
>> I used to teach that analysis is about what is not heard, but that  
>> any analysis is wrong that can't be heard. My students derided me  
>> for these contradictory statements. What I meant, however, is that  
>> analysis is about helping to hear what was not heard at first.
>
>
> At a more elementary level, I think that analysis is also about  
> helping to understand what is heard, even at first. I often find  
> that my students' ears (their acoustic brain, so to speak) do a  
> better job than their  verbal brain.
>

I tell my students that both purposes of analysis are fundamentally  
important: (1) becoming conscious of aspects of music that affect  
perception; (2) enhancing one's perception by becoming conscious of  
further aspects.

A point of comparison is offered by studying grammar or syntax of  
language. With one's native language, the purpose of such study  
corresponds to (1), with a foreign language, it often correspond to  
(2). In different kinds of music, there can be a lot of grey area  
somewhere between (1) and (2).

Olli Väisälä
Sibeius Academy
ovaisala at siba.fi

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