TrumpetMaster - View Single Post

JackD · 04-17-2006, 10:21 AM

I have to say, even though my parents probably listen to more classical music than most, I never got into it until I started my AS level music classes (that's age.. 17? The second last year of school)

Then, having been given some of the tools of how to understand the music I really started to enjoy it and get a LOT more out of it.

At the moment Daniel Barenboim is doing a series of lectures for the BBC ( http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/reith2006/ if you want to listen) and one of the things he was severely critical of in his last one I heard was the way people are encouraged just to go and sit in a concert hall, and almost ignore the music (thinking of extra-musical things, etc) in order to "get through" the concert, and perhaps absorb something cultural.

I have to agree - if you're exposed to say a Mahler symphony without having any understanding of its context, or the history of the genre, or the history of the symphony orchestra, or even a basic understanding of the forms and structures he inherited, then you're going to be pretty lost at sea.

Bit of a tangent, sorry! I'm just quite interested by this stuff.

04-17-2006, 10:21 AM	#6 (permalink)
JackD Mezzo Forte User Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Manchester / London Posts: 763	I have to say, even though my parents probably listen to more classical music than most, I never got into it until I started my AS level music classes (that's age.. 17? The second last year of school) Then, having been given some of the tools of how to understand the music I really started to enjoy it and get a LOT more out of it. At the moment Daniel Barenboim is doing a series of lectures for the BBC ( http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/reith2006/ if you want to listen) and one of the things he was severely critical of in his last one I heard was the way people are encouraged just to go and sit in a concert hall, and almost ignore the music (thinking of extra-musical things, etc) in order to "get through" the concert, and perhaps absorb something cultural. I have to agree - if you're exposed to say a Mahler symphony without having any understanding of its context, or the history of the genre, or the history of the symphony orchestra, or even a basic understanding of the forms and structures he inherited, then you're going to be pretty lost at sea. Bit of a tangent, sorry! I'm just quite interested by this stuff.