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Do You Understand Music?

First I want to describe something that repeats happening with me when I listen to the relatively new music to me.

There are a few examples that I want to describe:

1. I've acquired a rare CD of Cluster "One Hour" which contains one track that lasts exactly 1 hour. No matter how hard I've tried to listen to it as whole i was getting tired or just simply did not understand what's going on and was postponing a listening to the next session. Next session something similar happens and in curiosity I'm just trying to fast-forward to the last minutes of the track to hear how it ends. After few more trials to torture myself i quit and exchange this CD to the different offered by one of my best friend(Wobble-Parker). He digged in(meaning was able to listen the whole hour) from the third listening session and reviewed this music as one of the most magnificient projects created by Cluster for what I envy him to have a patience to understand.

2. Nearly the same thing happend with double CD album "Cobra" which is a project of John Zorn.

Some years ago I couldn't understand Ornette Coleman but now I realize that his music is like surrealistic art and has a divine presence. Same I can tell about Kronos Quartet.

Please share with me if you had a similar situations. Would you listen to the music that you don't understand? Would you try to understand it? Would you honor a "different" music and accept it as an art?

For me I'd rather listen to what I do not understand and try later-on to understand instead of just simply go to the Wiz and buy some Ricky Martin or Marc Anthony...
marakanetz

Showing 1 response by jameswei

jameswei
883 posts
 
An intriguing question. I've found that if I really can't relate to music on the first try, it generally doesn't get better on repeats. The fascinating part is that some of my favorite music started out as borderline on the first play. That is, it sounded OK but not great on the first try, then it grew on me. Examples include St. Germain (techno/jazz), Eva Cassidy (female vocal jazz), and Hugh Masekala (jazz with African themes), versus my nominal preferences for classical and smooth jazz. But the stuff that was far away to begin with, like FIM's Chinese instrumentals or very abstract jazz, never got closer.

I don't understand music in the way that musicians seem to. I don't have an appreciation for the detail and choices involved in the composition and performance. All I generally hear is the overall sound, the tone and direction of the music. I don't usually follow the play of individual instruments in a group performance. Maybe that's why good sound reproduction is more important to me than to a musician, who could get off on the artistry of what the musicians are doing rather than the overall effect. Somebody like that could be more appreciative of the stuff I can't relate to.
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