"Too Work": The Art of Listening to Music
At the end of February, the documentary The Art of Listening appeared in open access, which tells about the “journey” of a musical work from a workshop on creating instruments to processing sound in a studio and about the art of listening to music.
Composers, musicians, producers and engineers talked about their experience and understanding of music, and we decided to speculate on its perception and find out what influences listeners and what they should do so that all efforts to create works are not a waste of time and effort.
Photo by William Brawley CC-BY
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Some people prefer live music - every time they are different from the previous one, you can feel like a participant in the process of creating a piece and feel the energy of the musicians.
We have already written that, for example, for electronic music concerts, performers are preparing special material that cannot be heard on studio albums. Yes, and in any live performance there is always a place for improvisation.
Scientists conducted an experiment in which the subjects were asked to attend the live performance of classical music, and after ten weeks in the same room to listen to the recording of the same performance. Having studied the electrocardiograms and changes in the heart rate, the scientists came to the conclusion that live music has a positive effect on the physical condition of a person, and reduces the level of stress and anxiety. The perception is also changing: when listening to the recording, the pulse did not become more frequent in faster pieces of classical works.
But the musicians say that you can rarely get to a truly live performance today: speakers and other equipment are used at almost all concerts, which means that the way the sound is set determines the impression of the music. And right during the concert, the sound engineer does a great job of controlling and tuning the sound.
In addition, during the concert, other, extraneous factors influence the perception. For example, it may be too hot or uncomfortable due to large crowds. Therefore, the recording has certain advantages: you can listen to it in a comfortable environment, just when you want it. And this is the whole value of modern music - it begins to be associated with certain life moments and becomes a kind of memory trigger.
Canadian composer specializing in soundtracks, Michael Dunn (Mychael Danna) believes that it’s not so important whether the music is recorded or performed live, as in any case it is revealed at the very moment when it is heard. That is how she becomes alive.
A similar opinion is shared by the performer of electronic music, Christopher Willits (Christopher Willits), who argues that the musician creates a certain space, but everyone who comes there changes it. Music is transformed in the mind of the listener into something completely new. But the process does not end there: people share their feelings and she continues to live.
The dialogue between the listener and the performer occurs when they experience the same emotions from the same composition, but scientists have proven that the cultural identity and mood of the listener also influence the perception. And although the music conveys emotions , causes them and tells its story .
Gustavo Santaolalla, the composer and two-time winner of the Oscars, agrees that everyone who listens to music adds something of his own, so this process is very important in its creation. But the record contains the emotions of the artist, engineer, producer. All these people put their soul into the works. (More information about the work of a mastering engineer can be found here ).
Portability of music is at the same time both its main advantage, and the main lack. Today, people include compositions when they play sports or cook, play video games or have a lively conversation. Music became the background for everything else and people have forgotten how to hear it. Previously, listening to your favorite works turned into a ritual.
Today, you can turn on any song or melody with one click. As sound engineer Andrew Sheps noted (Andrew Scheps), the way people listen and perceive music changes with each generation. This does not mean that vinyl was better. Famous American composer Philip Glass said that the main problem with how people listen to music is that they don’t hear it.
In fact, this process requires a lot of effort and active participation from the listener. Then you can feel that the 12-string acoustic guitar does not sound like a seven-string, new sounds appear in synthesizers, and the drums have a tone. Researchers also note that a more thoughtful immersion also contributes to the more frequent occurrence of free-music, or goosebumps from the music.
Mastering engineer Alex DeTurk (Alex DeTurk) also believes that students must "work." At different stages of creating high-quality music, a large number of people invest a piece of themselves, and many of them spend their whole lives on it. And to get the whole range of sensations from listening to works of art in headphones somewhere on the subway from a compressed file is hardly possible.
John Storyk (John Storyk), an acoustic engineer and co-founder of the Walters-Storyk Design Group generally thinks that it is a shame for musicians when they spend time and money on production, and then their compositions are played in inappropriate conditions. According to Sony engineer Shunsuke Shiomi, high-end headphones and high-resolution audio files let you hear even microscopic sounds that define where the music was recorded.
In the end, it’s not that everyone should buy expensive audio systems. As David Chesky, composer and co-founder of the high-resolution music download site HDTracks, said, the listener should simply devote time to understanding what the musician has put into the song. Then the work of the whole huge industry will not be in vain, and people will be able to get much more pleasure from listening to their favorite music.
Composers, musicians, producers and engineers talked about their experience and understanding of music, and we decided to speculate on its perception and find out what influences listeners and what they should do so that all efforts to create works are not a waste of time and effort.
Photo by William Brawley CC-BY')
More than alive
Some people prefer live music - every time they are different from the previous one, you can feel like a participant in the process of creating a piece and feel the energy of the musicians.
We have already written that, for example, for electronic music concerts, performers are preparing special material that cannot be heard on studio albums. Yes, and in any live performance there is always a place for improvisation.
Scientists conducted an experiment in which the subjects were asked to attend the live performance of classical music, and after ten weeks in the same room to listen to the recording of the same performance. Having studied the electrocardiograms and changes in the heart rate, the scientists came to the conclusion that live music has a positive effect on the physical condition of a person, and reduces the level of stress and anxiety. The perception is also changing: when listening to the recording, the pulse did not become more frequent in faster pieces of classical works.
But the musicians say that you can rarely get to a truly live performance today: speakers and other equipment are used at almost all concerts, which means that the way the sound is set determines the impression of the music. And right during the concert, the sound engineer does a great job of controlling and tuning the sound.
In addition, during the concert, other, extraneous factors influence the perception. For example, it may be too hot or uncomfortable due to large crowds. Therefore, the recording has certain advantages: you can listen to it in a comfortable environment, just when you want it. And this is the whole value of modern music - it begins to be associated with certain life moments and becomes a kind of memory trigger.
Music speaks
Canadian composer specializing in soundtracks, Michael Dunn (Mychael Danna) believes that it’s not so important whether the music is recorded or performed live, as in any case it is revealed at the very moment when it is heard. That is how she becomes alive.
A similar opinion is shared by the performer of electronic music, Christopher Willits (Christopher Willits), who argues that the musician creates a certain space, but everyone who comes there changes it. Music is transformed in the mind of the listener into something completely new. But the process does not end there: people share their feelings and she continues to live.
The dialogue between the listener and the performer occurs when they experience the same emotions from the same composition, but scientists have proven that the cultural identity and mood of the listener also influence the perception. And although the music conveys emotions , causes them and tells its story .
Gustavo Santaolalla, the composer and two-time winner of the Oscars, agrees that everyone who listens to music adds something of his own, so this process is very important in its creation. But the record contains the emotions of the artist, engineer, producer. All these people put their soul into the works. (More information about the work of a mastering engineer can be found here ).
What is the problem
Portability of music is at the same time both its main advantage, and the main lack. Today, people include compositions when they play sports or cook, play video games or have a lively conversation. Music became the background for everything else and people have forgotten how to hear it. Previously, listening to your favorite works turned into a ritual.
Today, you can turn on any song or melody with one click. As sound engineer Andrew Sheps noted (Andrew Scheps), the way people listen and perceive music changes with each generation. This does not mean that vinyl was better. Famous American composer Philip Glass said that the main problem with how people listen to music is that they don’t hear it.
In fact, this process requires a lot of effort and active participation from the listener. Then you can feel that the 12-string acoustic guitar does not sound like a seven-string, new sounds appear in synthesizers, and the drums have a tone. Researchers also note that a more thoughtful immersion also contributes to the more frequent occurrence of free-music, or goosebumps from the music.
Mastering engineer Alex DeTurk (Alex DeTurk) also believes that students must "work." At different stages of creating high-quality music, a large number of people invest a piece of themselves, and many of them spend their whole lives on it. And to get the whole range of sensations from listening to works of art in headphones somewhere on the subway from a compressed file is hardly possible.
John Storyk (John Storyk), an acoustic engineer and co-founder of the Walters-Storyk Design Group generally thinks that it is a shame for musicians when they spend time and money on production, and then their compositions are played in inappropriate conditions. According to Sony engineer Shunsuke Shiomi, high-end headphones and high-resolution audio files let you hear even microscopic sounds that define where the music was recorded.
In the end, it’s not that everyone should buy expensive audio systems. As David Chesky, composer and co-founder of the high-resolution music download site HDTracks, said, the listener should simply devote time to understanding what the musician has put into the song. Then the work of the whole huge industry will not be in vain, and people will be able to get much more pleasure from listening to their favorite music.
How to listen to music and what it affects - in our other materials:
- The difference between "included music background" and "listen to music"
- Music lover Steve Guttenberg on where and how to listen to music
- To listen to music or not - that is the question
- Discussing the context of modern sound.
- How music affects our emotional state
- “Amazing Sound”: How what we hear can change our perception
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/402323/
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