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Are We Different?

All my life I have been more attuned to sensory experiences than my friends, family, or colleagues. I started to notice this in high school when I would go on and on about how great a particular passage sounded while playing in bands, I would rave about a meal that I ate, the smells of pleasant or unpleasant things, or a particularly good looking passage in a movie or piece of art.  

This question arose for me last week when talking to a friend and relating that I frequently get chills and goosebumps listening to music (live or in my living room). He looked at me as if he had no idea what I was talking about, and thought I was nuts. I thought that happened to everyone!! Since then I have been conducting an informal survey of folks I know about exactly that question. Again, most folks have no experience of this and think I'm bit off. So I wonder: Are we different? Is it something in our biology that lands us in the realm of audio-obsession, constantly looking for the perfect sound stage in our living rooms, and criticizing badly engineered recordings, or scoffing at the sound designers for poorly mixed live shows?

What is it that separates the music enthusiast/lover from the obsessed, ever-searching-never-satisfied, gear-heads which many of us are? 

Share your thoughts (and also do you get chills and goosebumps listening to Beethoven/Charlie Parker/The Stones?)
128x128birdfan
birdfan's avatar
birdfan OP
175 posts
 
@falconquest .. For myself playing music started as a mathematical puzzle to be conquered.. Only with muscle memory and thousands of of hours of listening did it start to become "creative"... but, when a moment of creativity does show its head, its as if I become only a vehicle for an idea already extant.. For me I guess it started in the left brain and became a whole brain experience only with practice.. no talent here...  
twoleftears's avatar
twoleftears
5,320 posts
 
Interesting.  I know that a certain passage in the last movement of Sibelius's 5th can give me a distinct frisson, but it's not automatic.  Likewise the Adagietto from Mahler's 5th.  Got to be in the right mood, got to be listening to the music and not the system, system has to be performing well, can also depend on the particular performance, etc. etc.
czarivey
5,946 posts
 
Well, I get bleeding defocation when consuming coffee. Bleeding would stop once coffee not used. Medics say that it maybe caused by medical condition that needs to be examined, but I say, perhaps I’m different and prefer to keep things as-is.


hifiman5's avatar
hifiman5
1,832 posts
 
I think as audiophiles and music lovers we are different.  The thing is identifying the origin of the difference varies widely from person to person.

The audiophile part of me was, in some ways baked in to my nature, as my sense of hearing has always been more acute than my other senses.
I am both a non smeller and non taster (lots of hot sauce).


The music lover part of me is curious as I think most of us would agree that the emotional connection we have to the music we enjoy is a right brain phenomenon.  I have completed several hemisphericity inventories and always score as a VERY left brain processor.  But maybe that's it.  Maybe music is the catalyst to activate my right brain.  One more thought, I do enjoy analyzing the "structure" of music as I listen to it.  Big for us left brainers!🧠
bdp24's avatar
bdp24
10,008 posts
 
I had a friend (R.I.P.) who possessed the highest intelligence of anyone I've ever known. And like myself and, I'm going to assume, everyone else here, music was of the utmost importance to him. It was in fact sacred to him (especially that of J.S. Bach), and he hated to see it trivialized. He couldn't bear to have music playing while people were speaking, even in a car. If music was playing, he felt one's full attention should be given to it---no "background" music for him. In fact, he couldn't NOT focus on music when it was playing, so had to insist that any car or room he was in not have music playing while people were conversing. Geez, Kent, lighten up!
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