Ways to Listen

There are lots of things to enjoy at a concert, lots of things to pay attention to. Your job is to be affected by the music, but you can be affected by what most appeals to you, or by whatever grabs your interest. Here are a few choices for what to listen to. Choose whatever you like, switch as often as you want, and feel free to add to the list.

• Moods and feelings
• Loudness and softness
• Different speeds
• Instrument sounds
• Melodies
• Rhythms
• Changes and transformations
• Beautiful performing
• Memories that get triggered
• Recognition of something heard earlier
• Visual images that come to mind

A concert is an event for the ears, but there is lots for the eyes, too. Watch the players and feel their energy and intensity; watch what they do to make their instruments sound in different ways. Watch as the music moves from one player, or group of players, to another. Watch the way the conductor controls events, or how he or she gives control to the musicians.

Don't worry; it happens to all of us at one time or another. Sometimes you don't connect with the music. It's perfectly normal.

If this happens, just let your attention be captured by one of the many ways of enjoying the music.

No one expects that you will like every moment of every concert. Remember, your job is to be affected, not to like everything. I can remember one concert where I didn't like the playing, but I still noticed that the music was touching me.

Everybody's taste is different, so a concert that is wonderful for one person might be awful for another. All you can do is let yourself be affected by whatever the music has to offer.

Human beings instinctively want to evaluate their musical experiences. Some music critics give the impression that the listener's job is to pass judgment on the performance, and that the performer's job is to try to get a good rating, like an Olympic ice skater.

Of course we all try to pick concerts that we will like, and we all talk about what moved us and what didn't. But don't be fooled by all the judgment that surrounds classical music. The listener's task is not to pass judgment, it is to be affected. Instead of asking yourself, "How good was it?" ask "What happened?"

There are snobs everywhere, in every field. Baseball snobs try to make you feel bad if you don't know Ty Cobb's lifetime batting average or Willie Mays'hat size. Computer snobs try to make you feel bad if you don't know a ROM from a RAM.

Classical music snobs are some of the snobbiest snobs of all. They try to make you feel bad by showing off their knowledge and declaiming their opinions. Often their snobbery masquerades as helpfulness, but snobs have a way of making you ashamed of your ignorance.

Nobody should feel ashamed of ignorance. If a classical music snob tries to shame you at a concert, don't take it personally. They're just showing off, and may be unaware that they are making you feel small in order to make themselves feel big.

Classical music has a reputation for snobbery, but in fact the audience is full of wonderful people who aren't snobs at all, people who come to enjoy the beauty of the music. These people know that what really matters is your willingness to open your mind and heart to the music.

See "The Listener's Job Description" at the beginning.