What is Musicality?

Musicnoise...LOL! Aside from that obvious statement...

I've glanced through most of the posts so far and took a day to really think about this before posting. Some came close to what I wanted to say. But here's my point. You could throw me in a beat up car with ratty speakers close to blown and as long as I have my music and have some volume to it I can completely immerse myself. If I'm away from home or at the park or wherever and I don't have my headphones, I can turn on my iPhone or touch and put my head down and listen to those crappy little itty bitty speakers and I can still forget the world exists outside my dreams.

Now don't mistake that for me saying I don't care about sound quality. I love it. But even for my mid-fi, modest, built on a budget 2-channel setup, I find myself oddly detracted from the music as I delve into the world of analysis. I find it awe-inspiring to hear what comes out of these speakers but it takes a lot more effort to immerse myself in my own little world because, well maybe its ADD, but every time I hear something really neat or something I've not heard before, I'm like... wow! Crap! I'm awake again.

Now if that truly holds any weight, then I should sell all my stuff and get a Bose system. (don't kill me.. it was a joke) Maybe this simple idea is going to be as controversial as digital vs. analog sources and which one has "soul". But then this idea has completely lost all ground since the idea of hi-fi is to get as close to the original recording as possible. I'm a violinist of 17 years and a drummer of 18 years. I know live music. I listen more than I play. Only way to know that what you play sounds good to others. But live music doesn't distract me from the music. Are we so utterly bound by the concept of true reproduction that when we finally sit down and listen we forget about the music and simply overwhelm ourselves with the capabilities of the equipment we use?

So that means I need to stop being happy with my gear, sit down, shut up, and enjoy. But I already do so I guess its getting back to learning how to get lost again in the music and forget the components. I guess it all goes back to whatever gets you rockin' regardless of how expensive or cheap it is. Bose not included as it is still a travesty to the audio industry. >-D

Tiggerfc, you're as close to what I am saying as I am. Musicality, the music, is inside us. Getting lost in it and really enjoying the musical experience does not depend on the gear. But good gear sure can enhance the experience.

Sabai

Sabai wrote in the OP:

Appreciating good music is not only a matter of how good your equipment is. It is a measure of how musical a person you are. Most people appreciate good music but some people are born more musical than others…

I think Sabai is right about this, and that the same thing could be said of appreciating novels, plays, movies, painting, or any other art form. Appreciation says as much about the appreciator as it does the thing appreciated. This raises the question:

Who are the best appreciators of an art form (in this case, music)?

One possible answer is that the best appreciators of an art form are the artists themselves. So musicians are the best appreciators of music, writers of writing, painters of painting, and so on. If that is true, then a person's APPRECIATION of an art form is directly proportional to his EXPERTISE with that art form. At least one poster, Kijanki, is extremely skeptical about this:

Are you suggesting that musicians are better listeners? Nothing can be further from the truth…Performers are not the best receivers of music, composers are not the best performers etc…

But Learsfool describes this statement as…

…completely absurd on the face of it. One cannot become a professional musician without VERY highly developed critical listening skills...

I think the conflict between Kijanki and Learsfool here is attributable to the fact that Kijanki is talking about listening APPRECIATION, and Learsfool is talking about listening EXPERTISE. That is an inherent ambiguity is the phrase “better listener” throughout this discussion. Here are the two possible interpretations:

1. Better listener = greater APPRECIATION.
...or...
2. Better listener = greater EXPERTISE.

I think that Learsfool is correct when he points out that professional musicians are better listeners in the sense that they have greater listening EXPERTISE than non-musicians. But I also think that Kijanki is correct when he points out that having greater listening expertise does not guarantee greater listening APPRECIATION.

I have expertise with an art form (not music), having spent nearly ten years devoted to it, and I can say from personal experience that the relationship between expertise and appreciation is not simple or linear. For example:

i. Expertise, particularly in its early stages, promotes analytic perception, which can be an obstacle to the appreciation of an art form. However, expertise, in its later stages, promotes holistic perception, which enhances the appreciation of an art form.

ii. Expertise raises a person’s standard for “good” art, which can be an obstacle to the appreciation of works that do not meet that personal standard. However, expertise, by raising a person’s standards for “good” art, can intensify a person’s appreciation of works that do meet that personal standard.

These are just two examples of how the relationship between expertise and appreciation is complicated, changing, and sometimes unpredictable. To be sure, artists know far more about their art form than others, but that knowledge can be both a blessing and a curse, when it comes to appreciation.

Jax 2, Just love your posts, I wish that I had posted them myself. :-)

Bryoncunningham, I think you have touched on something important as well!

Understanding musical theory doesn't make one particularly creative, as a composer must be, nor reading Ansel Adams books make one a 'great' photographer. But it sure doesn't hurt those that are looking to expand their knowledge and utilizing their inherent and learned skills, especially if they can accept their limitations.

Years ago I bought a book about 'how to fish'. While I didn't really catch many more or bigger fish, I sure learned all of the excuses for why I was unsuccessful, when I was. :-)

In that respect I think audio shares much with photography. We have a lot of 'picture' takers who fantasize that their photos rise to an art form, when they are in fact nothing more that personal expressions of a common experience.

Personally, I love audio most when it doesn't get in the way of a performance. And when it seems to, I just listen to that recording from the 'next room' which devalues the audio enhancements that serve the needs of an audio system to be heard as intended.

But folks, music, soul, whatever you want to call it, is only found in the composition and the performance, not in your audio systems!

FWIW