Spatial-temporal focus
General question:
Listen for contrasts. Listen for climaxes.Movement, form:
Listen for movement and sustained sound. What kind of movement? What kind of melodies?
Listen for phrasing. Where does a phrase begin, what is its course, where does it end?
Listen for single events versus continuity. Listen for gestalts versus fragments.
Listen for tension and relaxation.Divide the music into sections. Mark subdivisions if relevant. Characterize the sections.
Describe the overall form. How does the music come to an end?Sound:
Listen for the sound in itself. What kinds of sound? What sound qualities? What registers?
Clear and diffuse qualities. Volume and energy.Listen for particular sound sources, instruments, timbres.Listen for the qualities of the single sounds. Beginnings and endings of single sounds.
The dynamic evolution of a tone. Clarity. Vibrato. Pizzicato. Tremolo. Tone bending.Listen for the qualities of the high tones. Listen for the qualities of the deep sounds.Composite sound:
Listen for the qualities of composite sounds. Fusion and segregation of components.
Harmony and other kinds of simultaneity. Compound qualities of orchestration.Expansion of unison in several octaves. Interference. Simultaneity of noise and tone.Sound production:
What physical surfaces meet to produce the sound, and how do they meet?