All of us love listening to music, don’t we? This article provides a framework for music enthusiasts to enhance their ability to listen to and understand music. Being a good listener is all about having a broad perspective and depth in perception, and this is exactly what I am trying to elaborate through this post.
The Importance of being a good listener
The ability to listen is a blessing in disguise. Being able to express yourself is only half of what you need for effective communication. The other half depends upon how well you can listen.
It would be very difficult for you to connect with people if you aren’t listening to them carefully.
“We have two ears and one mouth so that we can listen twice as much as we speak.”
Music is an elegant form of conversation.
In fact, it’s an idea that is fundamental to all art that is known to mankind. You know a painting is extraordinary when it feels like it’s talking to you. The same is true for music.
This article is an attempt to help people be conscious enough to detect and resonate with everything that makes music beautiful. Let’s dive straight into some of the methods you can use to upgrade the way you listen to music.
Five Ways To Become Better at Listening to Music
Clear your head
All of us have our preferences when it comes to music. Some songs click instantly, some don’t. This is because at deeper levels of our mind we have a personalized set of parameters against which we try to test the songs that we are listening to at the moment.
This catalog of preferences is based on various aspects of our persona. It is also vaguely dependent on how well we understand the world.
Let go of your biases!
We evaluate every aspect of our life using this pre-existing information from our subconscious. We hardly ever realize exactly how this evaluation is done, and this may lead to biasing. Yes, we are biased towards a lot of things, including the kind of songs we like to hear.
Generally, we like to keep things simple. Is the song easy on the ears? Is the tune catchy and relatable? ‘Oh, I can’t listen to a song that’s 10 minutes long!’ We even reject music that belongs to certain genres sometimes.
What you should do
Whenever you feel that you aren’t able to connect with a particular song, artist, or genre, you can spend a few minutes on the internet to understand the purpose behind the kind of music that feels a little strange to you at the moment.
You have always been a fan of romantic songs? Why not give a chance to songs that are more political. Maybe you can try songs that offer a new perspective towards life and reflect the values of people from your society.
Clearing your head would mean not piling up your expectations from a song before even giving it a chance to express itself.
You don’t have to like every song you hear, but you should be capable of appreciating them for the five odd minutes you spend with them. I try to listen to every new song at least twice, and this is exactly what we’ll talk about next.
Once is not enough
How many times have you rejected a song at first, and only when you listened to it again sometime in the future, you realized how good that song was? Personally, I have a rule where I listen to a new song at least twice before passing judgment on it.
This habit is essential if you want to become a perceptive listener. People come from a myriad of social, cultural, and political backgrounds and all of that reflects in the music that they create.
Therefore, it’s possible for a song to not reveal its true nature and purpose unless you are tolerant and welcoming of its origins.
Why is it important to be sensitive
The most common themes in music are love, loss, and desire, and it’s insensitive when people tend to neglect other musical styles. According to data from 2019, around 40,000 new tracks are being added to Spotify every day. Not all of it is original music but you can still see how enormous that number is. There is so much to explore.
Sensitivity is, thus, an essential element for enhancing your perception. This does not happen easily though; it takes time.
Expand your musical vocabulary
I am asking you to stop using the words ‘slow’, ‘fast’, ‘mellow’, ‘loud’ and ‘upbeat’ to describe songs. Instead, you can expand your musical vocabulary, and use terms like – accents, acoustics, dynamics, resolution, modulation, movements, and syncopation to better understand your music.
It’s like reading books. You understand an author better if you have better vocabulary.
No song should have to impress you in the first 30 seconds. That would be a lot of pressure for a song to bear. Not every story can be told in such a short period of time. There are several elements that are essential to the construction of a good story. Let’s talk a little more about these elements.
The Sound of Silence
Music has two basic components – sound and silence. There would be no context in music without silence. You cannot fill every time-fraction of a song with notes and beats. You would be overdoing things and ruining the beauty and purpose of the song.
Fun Fact!
The words ‘Listen’ and ‘Silent’ are anagrams. This says a lot, doesn’t it?
The use of silence is not so prevalent in popular music, but great composers know how to use silence to their advantage. If you pick all the instruments and vocals apart, then you’ll find that not each participant is active throughout the length of the song.
They share the silence with each other and take the spotlight at different times to demonstrate the layers of musical amalgamation.
There are intervals between the various elements and sections of any song. The purview of silence is so profound and vast yet very few people talk or write about it.
I believe that there would be no music without silence. It is such a fundamental trait that the legendary duo Simon and Garfunkel wrote one of the most beautiful folk compositions of all time based on the idea that even silence has a voice of its own.
(‘The Sound of Silence’ by Simon and Garfunkel)
Focus on the various elements
It’s time that we talk more about the forms, patterns, and qualities of sound that constitute music. Silence is like ether; we cannot manipulate silence. We can only disrupt silence by manipulating the sounds that we can produce.
This is what I do when I want to study a good song. In the first attempt, I try to get an overall feel of the song. The first exposure is for the big picture. I then dissect the music into several layers. I hit play only to focus on the guitars, and I replay it only to listen to the drums or the bass this time.
What you should do
Try to listen to only the instruments by neglecting the vocals for starters. You will then be able to relate the instruments with each other, how they complement and contradict each other. This will help you in comprehending the structure and direction of any song.
We can instantly identify if a song has good lyrics or if it has been sung beautifully or not. Let’s expand our ability to listen in on the bridges that connect the vocals and lyrics with the instruments. The idea is to be able to reflect upon the subtleties of these subdivisions in music.
Some basic elements of music
I am listing below some of these basic elements that you can easily notice in all forms of music. You can click on each one of these terms to get their respective canonical definitions.
The framework of any song. This is how an overall piece of music is organized into similar and contrasting sections and routines.
The pattern of regular or irregular pulses caused in music by the occurrence of strong and weak beats or accents.
The time or speed of a piece of music.
How high or low a note sounds.
How loud or quiet the music is (either the overall sound or of individual notes/instruments within it). Also, how loud/quite are the notes or accents relative to each other.
The way in which melody, rhythm, and harmony are combined in a piece of music. What each part/instrument is doing and how it is being done at any given point.
The relationship between 2 or more simultaneously sounding notes.
Use your imagination to interpret how these elements are strategically placed in any song and how they work in conjunction with each other.
Let’s dive deeper to know more about layers and how they affect the music that they are an integral part of.
Find meaning in the layers
I am presenting a very simple example of how layers work like pieces of a puzzle in music. The easiest thing that you can do is to filter out the various instrumental and vocal sections and treat each of them as separate entities. This is an effective way of understanding how these layers work.
So please sit back, plug your headsets in, and listen to the following audio sections from the song Hysteria by Muse.
Section 1 : Bassline
Hysteria has one of the greatest basslines in the mainstream rock genre. I want to encourage more people to appreciate the low-frequency instruments, especially the bass. This bassline is electrifying but it gets monotonous and bland after a couple of iterations and so it needs support.
Let’s try something
Try to imagine what kind of drums would sound good over this bassline. This is something all of us can do. We have been banging our tables and desks with random beats all our lives. Put that piece of hidden talent to use here and see what you can come up with.
Section 2 : Drums
Section 3 : Guitars
The drums and the guitars sound boring if you listen to them individually. But when played together, it seems that the song is building up towards an eventual cadence.
All of the above three parts seem to be lacking something. These layers make sense only when they are placed on top of each other. Without each other’s presence and support, the song fails to register any attachment with our hearts. You’ll realize this after hearing the original track.
Section 4 : 'Hysteria' by Muse
By now you already know how each instrumental section sounds like. We’ll now see how the final product becomes much more splendid than the sum of its individual parts.
Do you still remember the beat that you came up with when you were listening to the bassline? How does it compare with the original beat used in the song? Let me know your thoughts in the comments section.
These layers will help you build perspective while listening to music
In the above example, we saw the most basic form of layering. Each of these layers has its own identity and purpose. However, they become complete and meaningful only when they work in unison with the other layers, just like pieces of a puzzle.
There can be several instruments that have been used in a song. There can be layers that appear only in certain sections of the song. Maybe there is an interplay or a conversation between two or more instruments and/or the vocalist(s) for a dramatic intro or outro.
All of this boils down to two things – the purpose of the song and the overall ambiance it wants to create. These are not just layers of music but layers of conversation and thought as well. Good songwriters know how to create and control the layers that their songs need.
Let's Conclude!
These were some of the ideas that are going to help you in improving your ability to appreciate good music.
As quoted by the legendary pianist and conductor Daniel Barenboim, “We listen to music mostly to forget things”. We put on our headsets to escape heartbreaks and loneliness, to forget about the world for a moment, and embrace an abstract dimension that seems better than reality.
Music indeed helps in forgetting bitter memories. At the same time, it also reminds us of the most powerful moments of our lives. Music is like that childhood treehouse where there are no rules that can bind us. Let’s help each other in making our lives a lot more meaningful through music.
I hope that this article was helpful and that I was able to put forward my thoughts and ideas in a concise and comprehensible manner. Please feel free to mention your views on this topic in the comments section. I would love to read your reviews and suggestions.
Thanks a lot for being a part of this. See you next time!
Video Source : YouTube
Check out Musicable’s blog here!
Other Recommended Articles
If you are someone who wishes to start out in the online world as a digital marketer, then we have the perfect article that can help you understand the market and the basics of digital marketing.