Listening to music

Active listening is a developed skill. If you can remember way back to your years in elementary school, you might remember having a General Music class where you worked on this skill. But if you're like most people, you probably just remember General Music as learning how to play the squeaky recorder and singing out of tune in the Christmas (politically correct, "holiday") concert.

Active listening has two main ideas to it. The first of the two is concentration, which makes the difference between active listening and passive listening. Start with a quiet setting (minimal distractions) and throw on your most expensive pair of headphones to get the best quality sound and once you hit play, concentrate on the music that you're hearing.

The second part of active listening is identification. Ask yourself these questions: What am I hearing? How does the music make me feel? What instruments are playing? How many different parts are going on at the same time (texture)? Does it sound professional or amateur? The list is infinite, the goal is for you to be able to create your own music related questions.

Budding musicians will benefit from active listening because it gives them a better idea of how their instruments or voices should sound (characteristic tone quality) and it heightens their musical awareness for when they are performing with other musicians.