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Has education expanded your listening tastes?

This point recently came up in another thread: a member was of the opinion (if I am paraphrasing them correctly) that critical thinking plays little role in what our tastes in music might be. We like what we like and that's it. So that begs the question for me, how many of us feel that our reaction to music is primarily rooted in the emotional centers of the brain and that rational analysis of musical structure and language doesn't potentially expand our range of musical enjoyment? I ask because I am not a professional musician, but I did take a few college level music history classes, learn to play guitar in my forties (now sixty,) learn to read music on a rudimentary level of competence, study a little music theory, and enjoy reading historical biographies about composers and musicians. I can honestly say that the in the last fifteen years or so, I have greatly expanded what types of music I enjoy and that I can appreciate music I might not "love" in the emotional sense that used to dictate what I listen to. Take Berg, Schoenberg, and Webern for example. Their music doesn't sweep you away with the emotional majesty of earlier composers, but I find their intellectual rigor and organization to be fascinating and very enjoyable. Same with studying the history of American roots music, I learned a lot about our cultural history and enjoy listening to old blues and country music now. How do other's feel about this emotion vs. learning to appreciate thing?
photon46
photon46 OP
1,087 posts
 
Rok2id, glad you found the link entertaining, I thought it was rather witty. I know what you mean about the difficulty of conveying the exact meaning of our thoughts in these forums, it can be difficult.

If anyone has any interest in further exploration of Bach's work and his times, a very entertaining and non-technical book is the easily read biography of Bach and Frederick the Great "Evening in the Palace of Reason." It explores the collision of Baroque and Enlightenment world views and how a challenge from Frederick goaded Bach into writing "A Musical Offering." http://www.amazon.com/Evening-Palace-Reason-Frederick-Enlightenment/dp/0007156618/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1393257326&sr=1-1&keywords=evening+in+the+palace+of+reason
rok2id's avatar
rok2id
7,859 posts
 
Photon46:

I put the book in my CART. Thanks for the tip. My bookcase currently is filled with books about music and war / military, so I know I will like it.

One of my favorite books "The German Way of War", has a section on 'The Orgins of Frederician Warfare'. Very interesting. Brings home the point that Geography is Destiny!

Cheers
rok2id's avatar
rok2id
7,859 posts
 
A music question:
I think about this a lot. What is the difference between a first chair violinist in any of the world's top Orchestras, and a person that makes a career as a violin soloist.

I assume a solo career would be more rewarding from both an artistic and financial perspective.

I am not aware of any situation where a player 'moved up' from Orchestra to solo career. What's holding them back? Could anyone talk about this?

Thanks

Cheers
brownsfan
1,508 posts
 
Rok2id, Lynn Harrell went from 1st Chair cello in the Cleveland to a distinguished solo career. On the other hand, I remember several years ago listening to Alban Gerhardt discuss the excruciatingly difficult decision he had to make in turning down an offer from the Berlin Philharmonic for 1st chair cello in favor of a solo career. I’m sure there are many other examples.
I will say this—if you think about the soloists that really do well, it is my perception they tend to have more than their fair share of personal charisma in addition to their musical talents. There are obvious examples where this is not true. But just think about people like Hillary Hahn, Itzhak Pearlman, Yo Yo Ma, Joshua Bell—they can work a crowd in a unique way.
For others, a steady job in a world class orchestra may be a better fit.
frogman
7,475 posts
 
It is a leap and mistaken assumption that going from concertmaster in a top orchestra to a solo career is necessarily "moving up". As Brownsfan points out "a steady job in a world class orchestra may be a better fit" for an individual; this could be for a variety of reasons.

First of all, the life of a soloist is not all that it may seem to be. Constantly traveling is very difficult on the person and that person's family, and different individuals will have different levels of tolerance to these difficulties. As musicians, some have more of a team-player mentality (to their credit) and find a great deal of satisfaction in the role of leader of an ensemble with the special relationships that are established, not only with the other players and instrumental sections, but also as liaison between these players and the conductor; a particularly important role in our age of constantly changing guest conductors. Additionally, and perhaps most importantly, soloists are often limited to performing certain solo works over and over again. As concertmaster a player can truly have the best of both worlds: playing in a top orchestra and performing all the wonderful orchestral repertoire, and also perform as soloist with that orchestra and (fairly regularly) as guest soloist with other orchestras; many do this quite successfully.
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