In some fields (art, architecture?) a formal education could help you to appreciate things which to the uninitiated look like ugly garbage!
I always find it fascinating to watch a skilled craftsman at work. It doesn't really matter what trade: music, carpentry, glass blowing. Many years ago I enjoyed watching a lorry driver backing a large articulated lorry into a narrow alleyway from a narrow city street. It would have challenged some people to just back an ordinary car into it.
Some understanding of the subject adds to this, if only to realise the difficulties which people routinely overcome in making music or making anything else. It also helps if you know what things are called so you can better recognise them: key change in music, or cantilever in a building.
I always find it fascinating to watch a skilled craftsman at work. It doesn't really matter what trade: music, carpentry, glass blowing. Many years ago I enjoyed watching a lorry driver backing a large articulated lorry into a narrow alleyway from a narrow city street. It would have challenged some people to just back an ordinary car into it.
Some understanding of the subject adds to this, if only to realise the difficulties which people routinely overcome in making music or making anything else. It also helps if you know what things are called so you can better recognise them: key change in music, or cantilever in a building.
The simple answer to the 1st question is, of course, no. If you know little or nothing about the technical aspects and history of music then your appreciation will primarily be focused on music as an emotional experience, which is certainly one of its most powerful attractions. OTOH, with no formal training whatsoever as I sat last night watching Nicola Benedetti as guest violinist at the DSO I could absolutely marvel at the virtuosity of her playing and her connection with the audience.
As you learn more about music (or any other artform) your emotional reactions are broadened and modified on an intellectual level, which can be both good and bad. While deeper insight has obvious benefits there is also the risk that sophistication can drift into snobbery and pretension. I also remain convinced that the rarefied sensibilities of some art cognoscenti lead them to appreciate works that objectively are ugly garbage.
As you learn more about music (or any other artform) your emotional reactions are broadened and modified on an intellectual level, which can be both good and bad. While deeper insight has obvious benefits there is also the risk that sophistication can drift into snobbery and pretension. I also remain convinced that the rarefied sensibilities of some art cognoscenti lead them to appreciate works that objectively are ugly garbage.
What a question i guess it is a good subject for a subjective debate . lol.
now as we develop in the womb i belive our hearing is the first sense we develop. it is also IMHO the most powerfull sense we have.. Im going to say a BIG NO!! as noone ever taght me to hear . A friend of mine is a high grading classical Piano player . He is also in a band that writes their own tunes now he tells me when he listens to music he is forever breaking the tunes down in is head and he offen finds it distrackting..
Ok here is a question if you where given the choice god forbid it . woud you either keep your vision or you hearing .. My answer i would rather keep my hearing. Ok no diy audio but still the music .
Best Regards Ian
now as we develop in the womb i belive our hearing is the first sense we develop. it is also IMHO the most powerfull sense we have.. Im going to say a BIG NO!! as noone ever taght me to hear . A friend of mine is a high grading classical Piano player . He is also in a band that writes their own tunes now he tells me when he listens to music he is forever breaking the tunes down in is head and he offen finds it distrackting..
Ok here is a question if you where given the choice god forbid it . woud you either keep your vision or you hearing .. My answer i would rather keep my hearing. Ok no diy audio but still the music .
Best Regards Ian
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Let me answer this way........
I once was going out with a girl who asked me why (rock) guitar players tend to "make faces" while playing. She was refering to the often contorted faces musicians make as they feel the music to their core. As guitar player myself (mainly bass) I totally understood this.
However, she played no instrument and had no musical background. To be honest, she would probably had made a terrible musician if she could not "feel" the music.
You are either born with it or not....... IMO
I once was going out with a girl who asked me why (rock) guitar players tend to "make faces" while playing. She was refering to the often contorted faces musicians make as they feel the music to their core. As guitar player myself (mainly bass) I totally understood this.
However, she played no instrument and had no musical background. To be honest, she would probably had made a terrible musician if she could not "feel" the music.
You are either born with it or not....... IMO
Or course! Playboy is doing that in the last 60 years.do man (that like women) need to be educated how to apreciatte a hot woman ?
My mother subscribed for mail order 10" dia. 78rpm records of classical music for me when I was three. I used to play them on the Bozo-the-Clown player with a cardboard disk for an amp. I loved Tchaikovski, years before I could read. When I started piano lessons 5 years later, a lot of artistic things I didn't have to be told. I just wanted it to sound like the record.
My brother could care less about music. He thinks the ambient sound CD's from Target are the best. He takes after the other side of the family.
I'm still learning how they do this or that. I took an organ lesson last year; I had the teacher spend half the time listening to an LP and asking "How did he do that?"
Otoh, sometimes knowing "too much" detracts from the enjoyment.
(one can see the "tricks" and flaws, recognize the patterns as "standard", become aware of technique less than good, and the like)
There are many levels, that's the basic truth. Often when you "peel the onion" one can
find new areas to appreciate, but often the areas that either formerly were appreciated by you are found to be no longer involving or interesting.
I'd liken the effect to the stages of human development - for example games and toys you may have dearly loved as a child may hold nil interest or joy for you now.
By the same token you can only experience something for the first time once.
It's a complex question and the answers are not simple.
When I was a young teenager and heard "modern" jazz for the first time(s) I dismissed it as random noise. It was very difficult for me to follow the form and discern the beauty and excitement in it. I was not a neophyte in terms of listening to classical or pop music either, and had studied some basic music and could make reasonably musical sounds on a few instruments at that time. Quite a few years later, more or less dragged to NYC jazz clubs by a GF, it "clicked".
Otoh, listening to some 60s pop music like the Beatles Hard Days Night for example still manages to sound fresh. So...
_-_-bear
(one can see the "tricks" and flaws, recognize the patterns as "standard", become aware of technique less than good, and the like)
There are many levels, that's the basic truth. Often when you "peel the onion" one can
find new areas to appreciate, but often the areas that either formerly were appreciated by you are found to be no longer involving or interesting.
I'd liken the effect to the stages of human development - for example games and toys you may have dearly loved as a child may hold nil interest or joy for you now.
By the same token you can only experience something for the first time once.
It's a complex question and the answers are not simple.
When I was a young teenager and heard "modern" jazz for the first time(s) I dismissed it as random noise. It was very difficult for me to follow the form and discern the beauty and excitement in it. I was not a neophyte in terms of listening to classical or pop music either, and had studied some basic music and could make reasonably musical sounds on a few instruments at that time. Quite a few years later, more or less dragged to NYC jazz clubs by a GF, it "clicked".
Otoh, listening to some 60s pop music like the Beatles Hard Days Night for example still manages to sound fresh. So...
_-_-bear
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Hey All,
A practical engineer is someone that can build an amplifier, or a racecar, or a house without being taught how to do so. An engineer is someone who can describe mathematically how to build an amplifier,... to someone else so that they can build it. The first has talent, intuition and practice. The second has a formal education.
The same is true of music, art or literature. We all know, almost instantly, what we like or don't like in art. It is an emotional reaction that most people have. (What is surprising is that there are people who do not.) Emotions are innate, or so deeply rooted in childhood that they are beyond memory. Education in art only becomes important if you want to TALK about art with other people. This is the realm of criticism. Its takes either formal education or long exposure and intense introspection, not to mention intelligence.
If you enjoy music you appreciate it. Most people prefer what makes them feel good.
But lets say you want to talk about classical composers. Well, the fact is, there is only one composer that is in the defined group of composers who are called classical. Beethoven. But this is because over the centuries people who talk about, think about, or write about music have a SHARED definition of what is a classical composer.
Anyone can tell you what they like or don't like when it comes to music. But to be able to tell you WHY they like it AND be understood takes something more.
A practical engineer is someone that can build an amplifier, or a racecar, or a house without being taught how to do so. An engineer is someone who can describe mathematically how to build an amplifier,... to someone else so that they can build it. The first has talent, intuition and practice. The second has a formal education.
The same is true of music, art or literature. We all know, almost instantly, what we like or don't like in art. It is an emotional reaction that most people have. (What is surprising is that there are people who do not.) Emotions are innate, or so deeply rooted in childhood that they are beyond memory. Education in art only becomes important if you want to TALK about art with other people. This is the realm of criticism. Its takes either formal education or long exposure and intense introspection, not to mention intelligence.
If you enjoy music you appreciate it. Most people prefer what makes them feel good.
But lets say you want to talk about classical composers. Well, the fact is, there is only one composer that is in the defined group of composers who are called classical. Beethoven. But this is because over the centuries people who talk about, think about, or write about music have a SHARED definition of what is a classical composer.
Anyone can tell you what they like or don't like when it comes to music. But to be able to tell you WHY they like it AND be understood takes something more.
Yes.
You need to have knowledge beforehand or else it will sound like noise. Or in case of other arts it will not make much sense.
If you only have listened to Western music, you will not appreciate Arabic/Indonesian/Somali/etc... music that does not follow the western rules of music. To appreciate it you need to be educated. Iaw you need to be in contact with it and learn the rules, then you can appreciate it. But you do not need to be an expert.
You need to have knowledge beforehand or else it will sound like noise. Or in case of other arts it will not make much sense.
If you only have listened to Western music, you will not appreciate Arabic/Indonesian/Somali/etc... music that does not follow the western rules of music. To appreciate it you need to be educated. Iaw you need to be in contact with it and learn the rules, then you can appreciate it. But you do not need to be an expert.
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