Four Tiers of Listening in Contemporary DIY Music & Sound-making Practice Series – Part 1c
This blog represents the third in this series, the four (4) tiers of listening required in Contemporary DIY Music & Sound-making Practice. Please refer to my previous blog post for Part 1b, Musicking (Page, 2015b).Introduction
In a previous post Part 1a, Required skills of a Contemporary Music & Sound-making Practitioner, I noted “(a)ctive listening, the ability to hear musically and sonically, is a technical skill which is an essential attribute of a contemporary music practitioner (Page, 2015a)”
In Part 1b, Musicking [what I refer to Tier 0] I introduced how lay people – generally – passively consume “music without necessarily the intent or the trained technical skills to listen to music in any other way. The consumer were people like my mother and myself as a kid: people who just listened to music for enjoyment, without understanding what exactly they were listening to. We just listened to music because we ‘liked it’ ” (Page, 2015b).
On the contrary, active listeners need an intent – a purpose, a motivation – to listen to music in other ways (Elliot, 1995, 42). Active listeners have a need to understand what exactly they were listening to.
Active listening needs to should be considered an active, progressive, immersive process. The word process is a key word. Process infers a gradually illuminating process as one progresses through different depths of the music & sound artefact – layers or tiers if you like – to derive different aspects – characteristics – of the music & sound artefact. The musical and sonic characteristics of the music & sound artefact.
In Required skills of a Contemporary Music & Sound-making Practitioner, I introduced three (3) primary tiers of active listening as:-
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- holistic listening
- analytical listening, and
- critical listening.
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Listening as a VERY active disciplined process.
You were encouraged to – as an aspiring Music & Sound Practitioner – to make a committment to your development of all things musical and sonic. Yes, have a specific intention.
You are encouraged to use all available resources at your finger tips:
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- DAWs
- Internet-based resources and tools (such as HookTheory, ToneGym and SoundGym), and
- DAW included 3rd Party plug-ins
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You will need to develop your conceptual understanding, and your terminology of the musical and sonic characteristics.
I would therefore advise to make detailed notes in a Learning Journal as you progressively dive deeper into the listening tasks for later Reflection. Perhaps you may use the headings I provide below under each Tier’s heading to focus your listening task.
In terms of musicology, what do the terms of rhythm, harmony, melody and lyrics refer to? and in terms of practical applications, how can you develop your ability to ‘hear’ very specific elements and nuances within each of the characteristics to be able to differentiate subtle changes in beats per minute (BPM), time signatures, harmonisation, melodic lines and the lyrical themes, narrative perspectives and rhyming schemes of a desired ‘Reference’ track (a specific track you want to use as an ‘influence’).
In terms of sonics, what do the terms of amplitude level, stereo field, spectral, dynamic and time-domain mean?, and in terms of practical applications, how can you develop your ability to ‘hear’ very specific elements and nuances within each of the characteristics to be able to differentiate subtle changes in volume, placement of all of the sound sources across the stereo field, frequencies, dynamic manipulation, and time-based processing of a desired ‘Reference’ track (a specific track you want to use as an ‘influence’).
So, on that note, lets delve a little deeper into the three (3) primary tiers of active listening.The Three Primary Tiers of Active Listening in Contemporary DIY Music-Making Practice
Tier 1: Holistic Listening
Commencing with a very global first impression of the music & sound artefact, your first sweep of listens – the first tier – , one should be able to determine some of the following general charaterisitcs:
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- Listening to the overall aesthetics (feel/emotions/mood of the ‘performance’/delivery)?
- rough Beats per Minute (BPM)? (that is, fast, medium or slow in its pace?)
- What genre is the piece, and as such what generalisations can you make about it?
- what instruments can you hear?
- is the Metre (time signature) obvious?
- any additional obvious textures and/or layers?
- the rough arrangement of intro, verse, chorus, outro, etc?
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Tier 2: Analytical listening
Your second sweep of listens – the second tier – will likely involve multiple listens. Progressing deeper into the artefact you will continue to listen with greater concentration until one can determine the musical qualities of the Reference track.
For example:
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- what is the BPM (exact);
- the time signature. For example: simple time, or compound time?;
- the key. For example: tonal environment/s;
- the musical structure/form. For example: intro, verse, chorus, middle 8, outro, & embellishments;
- the rhythm. For example: pulse, beat, stress;
- the harmony. For example: Major, minor;
- the melody. For example: scale, intervals, modes;
- the lyrics. For example: narrative overall (writer’s intention), song structure/form (song map), section
- the structure/form (line number & length), rhyme schemes, choice of words & phrases, lyric phrasing (metre vs rhythm);
- the instrumentation. For example: timbre of chosen instruments;
- the ‘performance’/delivery of/by the artist/s. For example: the singer/s, the drummer/percussionist, the rhythm player/s, the solo player/s?;
- the arrangement of the Reference track. For example: which instruments are in which part/section of song? how sparce or multi-layered is it in each part/section of song?
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Tier 3: Critical Listening
The 3rd Tier of listening is Critical Listening. Critical Listening refers to sonic qualities of music and sound. Sonic qualities were traditionally explored and developed in the ‘post-producution’ stage; but more likely to be explored and developed in this era of conflated practice within the composition and/or production stages. These could be of either corrective and/or creative functions and intent.
Critical Listening refers to sonic qualities such as:
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- the gain level balance (volume level of each sound source);
- the stereo image/stereo field (placement of sound sources relative to a stereo field or stage plot);
- the spectral qualities (frequencies chosen to highlight to afford every sound source to ‘shine’). Specifically,
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- Equalisers;
- Filters;
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- the dynamic qualities (amplitude-based contour of music & sound piece). Specifically,
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- Compression;
- Limiting;
- Gate;
- Expanders;
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- the time domain/spatialisation qualities. Specifically,
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- Reverb;
- Echo;
- Delay;
- Chorus;
- Flangers;
- etc;
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- the timbre of each sound source, and
- overall mix considerations, such as,
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- any points of musicological interest A. For example: recurring patterns, repetition and themes such as hooks, motifs, and leitmotifs irrespective of the medium or element of music & sound;
- any points of musicological interest B. For example: generally, but not always, performance-based highlights such as the delivery of a vox, a drum rhythm, a lead guitar break, etc, etc..
- any points of sonic interest. For example: gradual rises (Shepard’s tone) & drops, sudden rises and drops, highlighting particular sonic frequencies.
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Conclusion
Whilst this is only an introductory blog to a number of the concepts and terminology of the musical and sonic characteristics, it should mark the beginning of a journey for an aspiring contemporary DIY music & sound-making practitioner. Given listening as a VERY active disciplined process, you were encouraged to – as an aspiring Music & Sound Practitioner – to make a committment to your development of all things musical and sonic. Yes, have a specific intention.
You are encouraged to use all available resources at your finger tips:
-
-
- DAWs
- Internet-based resources and tools (such as HookTheory, ToneGym and SoundGym), and
- DAW included 3rd Party plug-ins
-
Given you will need to develop your conceptual understanding, and your terminology of the musical and sonic characteristics, accept the challenge to explore as many of the concepts. There are a large number of recommended texts list in the bibliography below, just as a starting point.
I also advised you to make detailed notes in a Learning Journal as you progressively dive deeper into the listening tasks for later Reflection. Perhaps you may use the headings I provide above under each Tier’s heading to focus your listening task.
Both in terms of musicology, and sonics. In contemporary DIY music & sound-making practice, it is highly complex field due to the degree of hybridisation of music & sound styles (genres), and conflation of workflows. Music & sound can no longer be regarded as ‘seperate’ elements of music & sound artefacts. The creation, the production and post-production ‘stages’ of music & sound-making no longer seperate, linear stages; they are conflated and convergent (Page, 2019).
So continued goodwill in your immersive listening development journey. As it will take several years for you to achieve a degree of mastery in your Listening skills, please commence your Music & Sound Production immersion journey consciously and progressively NOW!!
Footnotes
[1] Examples of resources that exist in the market place to support contemporary DIY music producers with knowledge and influence are: 1) academic texts, academic journals, functional textbooks, industry associations, industry conferences, industry trade magazines, product and service providers, manufacturers and distributors, specialist professionals such technicians and engineers, forums, blogs and websites; courses, and; cultural production artifacts such as albums, CDs and mp3s.
[2] A novice ear listening to cultural production artifacts[2] could reveal elements such as: the genre, aesthetic qualities, general instrumentation, musical structure, lyric or musical message, and spatial placement.
[3] Examples of cultural production artifacts in the field of music production are: albums, CDs and mp3s
[4] Many believe the unique range of sonic qualities or textures are the elements that influence and motivate music producers to create.
[5] Advice traditionally came from work-place training , via a trainer, adviser or ‘mentor’
[6] Employment could be a paid or unpaid role, usually very menial such as coffee boy or cleaner
[7] I developed my active listening skill within industry, via workplace-training. Today, as part of my ongoing professional development process, I routinely reserve time to proactively develop my listening across a range of cultural production artifacts, and genres. Of particular interest to me are: innovative structures, techniques or equipment other practitioners may be employing in their production or post-production process, to realise unique musical or sonic qualities or textures.
This Four Tiers of Listening in Contemporary DIY Music & Sound-making Practice Series continues with Part 2a, Reference Tracks (2015c).
