Concert List

Musical Compostion – How To Listen To Music Like A Composer-Did you know that there is more than one way to listen to music? I first read about this from a small book by composer Aaron Copeland.

You see most people listen to music as if something were washing over them. They listen to the oncoming barrage of notes and chords and never wonder or understand how it achieves the effect it does.

Not composers. They listen differently. While most people enjoy music for music’s sake – a composer listens for sections or how the music is constructed.

I’m not saying that composers never listen to music for pure enjoyment. That would be terrible. No. What I’m saying is that a composer or anyone who takes the time to learn, can begin to hear how music is put together.

And most music created today is comprised of sections. More specifically, we have A and B sections, introductions, transitions and endings and so on.

All these “pieces” go into creating a piece of music. Even spontaneously improvised pieces of music have been given a name by composers. They call it “through composed” which means that there are no distinctly repeating sections.

For example, take the lesson “Cirrus.” It starts out with a few notes that, by themselves, seem to go nowhere. But, if you listen to the entire piece of music, you’ll begin to hear sections. Musical composition is the art of repetition and contrast. This is what composers listen for. They listen to see how the songwriter uses these 2 qualities. The piece “Cirrus” was actually an improvised piece but it turns out that even with this, you can hear that repetition and contrast was used.

This can be done consciously, as many composers do as they create a piece, or simply generated spontaneously as in the case of “Cirrus.”