Music Listening, Music Therapy, Phenomenology and Neuroscience

Appendix

 2.04

 Experimental

 listening
 Webern

7

25th listening: Sound production: Question: What surfaces meet to produce foc
the sound, and how do they meet?

Many light bow strokes bordering on nothing, soft movement, the sound of the bow is heard
Flageolets: the string is touched lightly, without pressure
The first deep tone: full stroke, lovely vibrato
Snarling sound without tone, continues as a tone

S3: impressive pizzicati, intensive tremolo, marcato deep sound, change to gentle sounds, good
contrast

General factors in sound production:
pressure, speed, touch of the finger, touch of the bow, size and thickness of string

EC’s afterthought: The way surfaces meet to produce the sound of string instruments is often
prescribed and described in the score and taught as instrumental technique

LCB defines the three last listenings

26th listening: Focus on particular surfaces that meet: LCB wants to listen for foc
a certain scratching sound: whzzzz!, like a wasp, in order to find out how it continues

LCB: No precise answer
EC: Identified the sound that LCB pointed out, and unexpectedly heard the music in a new way,
from a new viewpoint, focusing on the sound in question. ”Three dark voices and something
around them” **

27th listening: S4: How does the music come to an end? foc

The last sound but one is a particularly lovely concord. This is also the case in S3

Additional observation: double pizzicati in S3, may be played by one or two instruments

28th listening: Open listening of all six bagatelles open

LCB: Lots of fun!

Appendix 2.03 Experimental listening Webern Appendix 2.05 Experimental listening Hawkins^1

Experimental listening 12 Oct 2011. EC’s preparation

Coleman Hawkins, Saxophone: Body and Soul

Recorded 11 Oct 1939

Abbreviations: open: open listening. foc: music-focused listening.

herm: hermeneutical listening.

EC’s preliminary observations and reactions, new questions, new tasks, and problems:

1st and 2nd listening : Open listening (intro + two choruses) open/herm

The sax tone displays an intimate, caressing, persuasive or imploring nature

New question: If this is speech, what does he say?

New task: Listen only for background

3rd listening: Listen for form (intro + two choruses) foc

Intro AABA AABA, 8-bar periods

New tasks: Describe as movement (gliding, jumping....)

Describe as voice (exclamations, whispering...)

Subsequent listenings: Only intro + the first chorus

4th listening: Listen only for background foc

New task: listen for piano, bass, drums separately

5th listening: Listen for the piano. Are there other instruments in the background? foc

One chord per beat. Difficult to hear details due to mediocre recording quality

New question: Is there a climax?

New task: Describe as bodily gestures

6th-7th listening: Listen for the bass foc

The bass plays on the 1st and 3rd beat. Tone quality: A soft thud