So I....

[tumababa]

I know that this post will sound self important or possibly even arrogant so let me just PLEASE try and dispel that before I get into any sort of raw conversation; I try to be a humble person.  That is to say, when I'm confronted with something as objective as art I pretty much remain silent beyond a casual opinion.   So if I come off as a dick I'm sorry.


So.......

I'm at the bar and a friend of mine revealed an amazing truth to me that I never before had even considered.  After he spoke to me I was cast into a trance of melancholy and desparation. Just so you know, this isn't some pompous rockstar post.  I really felt like *** and I'm usually a pretty upbeat person. 

On my long walk home I kicked in windows, I tore down signs, and I threw garbage cans over my shoulder like they were going out of fashion.  And yet, what he said to me was so simple and stupid that I felt I had known it all along.....

"People don't actually like music".

Before you go off on tangents about how people dont' UNDERSTAND classical music let me just say I'm not talking about classical music(Although, I'd rather not call it that).  I'm talking about everything;  Classical, funk, jazz, metal, latin, rock, punk, country, ethnic, and miscelanious(?spelling?).

Fiirst of all when I define "like", I'm talking about something specific. ...

Have you ever been in a room and heard through the walls, a piece being played next door; a piece whose presence forced your mind to block out all extra-perception and bask in it's immediate glory and magnificence? To block out all extra-sensory-perception except for the one(or more) senses that were focused on the music at hand?

For me, I was in the hospital after my appendix burst and I heard WEEZER drifting through the floor as I lay there in a medicated haze.  It lifted my up out of my four day retardation and got me fighting again.  That's what I mean when I say like. 

Now....  drop all concepts of style, form, technique, and meaning.  Does music touch you even if it is meaningless? It  touches me but as I saw at the bar, music affects the few.  If weezer can play on the stereo and not affect you in the slightest I hate to think what you  must be missing if I plug  in Beethoven 9. 

Again,  I don't want to be elitist with my preference for classical music.  But is it true?!!


DO PEOPLE ACTUALLY NOT LIKE MUSIC?!!

If so, please don't wax on why, but how. 

If not, please wax on how, not why.

And please.... no arrogant posts about how Beethoven is better than Kool 'an the Gang.  They're both equal in the grand scheme of things.

[bernhard]

I think your friend, if not correct, is certainly on to something.

Let me give it a perhaps slightly different slant to it.

All around us there are what I call “open secrets”. Knowledge that would of great interest to us and that would definitely be in our best interest to have. From how to heal ourselves from any disease to how to perform the most complicated piece of music. When we hear that such “secrets” exist, we want them revealed to us. And we want them right now. But they are a special kind of secret. They are “secret” not because someone is purposefully hiding them from us, and we depend on this someone willingness to reveal them. They are “secret” because they demand some kind of effort on our part . They are open. They are there for all to see, and yet no oe can be bothered to look.

Take juggling, for instance. Most people who decide to juggle try it for a couple of minutes and give up in desperation: “This is too difficult, I will never be able to do it”.And the difficulty/impossibility is indeed real. Yet – and paradoxically – if you persist  (I never met anyone that could not juggle after 15 minutes of guided effort), the difficulty vanishes surprisingly quickly, and you cannot even understand what was it that you found so difficult in the first place.

Or take reading. You cannot even begin to explain to an illiterate person who lived isolated in some rural area all his/her life why they should bother to learn to read. “Why should I learn to read?” Any advantage you may come up with is understandable only to literate people. The illiterate person will have to trust you that great benefits will accrue from  his learning to read. (Which is why our very literate society makes reading compulsory for little children). Reading is indeed an “open secret”. No one is hiding it from you, in fact everyone is putting a lot of effort in trying to reveal it to you. Yet it will remain a secret unless you put some effort into it. And since an illiterate person cannot even fathom why they should put any effort toward it, the chances are that it will remain a secret.

It is as if there was a protection built around certain kinds of knowledge to avoid the unworthy to get it.

Music is such an open secret. Unless you put some effort into it, it will not yield its secrets.

Most people do not realise that the universe is multi-layered. As far as we know it could even be infinitely layered. Some people are happy to live in the first layer, the world of appearances: what we see, what we hear, what we taste what we smell, what we touch without realising that sensory perception is but a model of a reality that continually eludes us. Most people have even lost touch with this first sensual model and live in a world modelled by language, stuck forever in second hand verbal descriptions.

I always find amusing all this talk about how no one goes to concerts anymore, how one does not buy classical music CDs anymore and how this is going to be the end of classical music.

In fact, this will be the end of  a few people making a lot of money out of it.

What keeps music going (classical or otherwise) is not the public. What keeps music going is the performers/creators.

There is a huge amount of people right now quietly playing the piano. They don’t make a big fuss about it, they do not perform in public, sometimes they will not even perform for anyone. They just play for themselves and do not tell anyone about it (I have several students in this category).

These are the people who actually guarantee that certain pieces remain in the repertory. If you want scores for some obscure pieces from some obscure composers, you better start playing it, since no publisher is going to print obscure music for Hamelin to play.

If you are a football watcher, you will experience a certain level of the game. The level that is open for all to experience. But if you actually play football, new layers of the game will reveal themselves to you. But playing takes far more effort than just watching. In fact most football lovers do not really “like” to play football, and would rather just watch it. Which is great for business, but not for your diabetes/heart condition.

Likewise in music, one needs to play a musical instrument to start to have access to its open secrets. But that requires effort. And no one wants that.

Music is not really for the masses. Music is for a few. This should not depress anyone. If you are not one of the few (evidenced by the fact that you are not willing to put the effort and enjoy that effort), just do something else. And if you are one of the few, why should you be depressed?

This is like a lot of (religious and otherwise) preachers, constantly demanding that you conform to their beliefs, when in most cases, they themselves cannot live up to it. In fact, it is a sure sign that one cannot live up to one’s beliefs when they start insisting that everyone else should conform to them.

So it is not really a case of liking or disliking music. It is more a case of not wanting to put in the effort. Like the illiterate they cannot understand why they should learn to read. And they never will since this understanding requires your ability to read in the first place.

In short, why should you care if people like music or not, if they want to put an effort towards it or not? It is not really your problem, is it? Concentrate instead in your liking of music, on the effort you are prepared to make towards owning that secret.

It should keep you busy for a while (and busy people do not get depressed).

Best wishes,
Bernhard.

[pianonut]

some people don't like to listen to music because it wasn't something they did as a child.  i think we gravitate to things that we are familiar with.  if you grow up in an unmusical home, you probably won't be going to a concert featuring beethoven's 9th (which the philly orchestra happens to be playing this monday at the mann). 

if i were to have unlimited monies, i'd take my kids to all kinds of musicals, operas, and yes, rock groups occasionally (my daughter hates classical - of course, because i play pianO) and expose them to it early.  they form a lot of opinions even by age 8.

that is the age that i put my daughter into a children's chorus for two years.  at first she insisted she didn't like music at all (despite a great voice) and didn't want to do it.  i said, you have to either play an instrument or get vocal instruction - but you can't just sit and do nothing.  she complained - but yet, enjoyed it in the end.  they would have concerts that included some choreography and they had interesting locations to sing.  my theory as a parent is to expose your children to lots of music because when they do form opinions later - it will be based on what they actually know vs. what they think they know.

[pianonut]

ps  i totally concur with bernhard's post, too!  well put, about the secrets you can learn if you take the time and effort.

[pianowelsh]

I honestly dont think its correct to believe that people really dont like classical music = although some really dont! but it is true to say that people like and enjoy what they are used to and so many people are fundamentally illiterate when it comes to classical music and they are only pumped a stock few 'classics' - i can tell you that had i had the very limited exposure that some people have to the genre as a youngster i may not have liked it but fortunately i was encouraged to listen to all kinds of things in the classical genre as well as other things. I think another problem is that academics make them feel their ignorance of classical music and this really insults people only enforcing their distaste for it. I never believe people who say they dont like music or even classical music I just try to make out what their underlying artistic tastes are and lead them in via the back door. I often give informal concerts which have a bit of all sorts in them and you would be amazed the people who come and enjoy themselves - it might not be very sophisticated by some standards to mix everything up like that (but it used to be the norm in concert programming!) and people invariably find they like at least something and they come back - in fact i have people asking me when i will do another. You can never please everyone all the time but i reackon you can always find something that will communicate to people we just have to be resourceful and perhaps sometimes a bit more eclectic in our tastes?!

[m1469]

I think your friend, if not correct, is certainly on to something.

Let me give it a perhaps slightly different slant to it.

All around us there are what I call “open secrets”. Knowledge that would of great interest to us and that would definitely be in our best interest to have. From how to heal ourselves from any disease to how to perform the most complicated piece of music. When we hear that such “secrets” exist, we want them revealed to us. And we want them right now. But they are a special kind of secret. They are “secret” not because someone is purposefully hiding them from us, and we depend on this someone willingness to reveal them. They are “secret” because they demand some kind of effort on our part . They are open. They are there for all to see, and yet no oe can be bothered to look.

Take juggling, for instance. Most people who decide to juggle try it for a couple of minutes and give up in desperation: “This is too difficult, I will never be able to do it”.And the difficulty/impossibility is indeed real. Yet – and paradoxically – if you persist  (I never met anyone that could not juggle after 15 minutes of guided effort), the difficulty vanishes surprisingly quickly, and you cannot even understand what was it that you found so difficult in the first place.

Or take reading. You cannot even begin to explain to an illiterate person who lived isolated in some rural area all his/her life why they should bother to learn to read. “Why should I learn to read?” Any advantage you may come up with is understandable only to literate people. The illiterate person will have to trust you that great benefits will accrue from  his learning to read. (Which is why our very literate society makes reading compulsory for little children). Reading is indeed an “open secret”. No one is hiding it from you, in fact everyone is putting a lot of effort in trying to reveal it to you. Yet it will remain a secret unless you put some effort into it. And since an illiterate person cannot even fathom why they should put any effort toward it, the chances are that it will remain a secret.

It is as if there was a protection built around certain kinds of knowledge to avoid the unworthy to get it.

Music is such an open secret. Unless you put some effort into it, it will not yield its secrets.

Most people do not realise that the universe is multi-layered. As far as we know it could even be infinitely layered. Some people are happy to live in the first layer, the world of appearances: what we see, what we hear, what we taste what we smell, what we touch without realising that sensory perception is but a model of a reality that continually eludes us. Most people have even lost touch with this first sensual model and live in a world modelled by language, stuck forever in second hand verbal descriptions.

I always find amusing all this talk about how no one goes to concerts anymore, how one does not buy classical music CDs anymore and how this is going to be the end of classical music.

In fact, this will be the end of  a few people making a lot of money out of it.

What keeps music going (classical or otherwise) is not the public. What keeps music going is the performers/creators.

There is a huge amount of people right now quietly playing the piano. They don’t make a big fuss about it, they do not perform in public, sometimes they will not even perform for anyone. They just play for themselves and do not tell anyone about it (I have several students in this category).

These are the people who actually guarantee that certain pieces remain in the repertory. If you want scores for some obscure pieces from some obscure composers, you better start playing it, since no publisher is going to print obscure music for Hamelin to play.

If you are a football watcher, you will experience a certain level of the game. The level that is open for all to experience. But if you actually play football, new layers of the game will reveal themselves to you. But playing takes far more effort than just watching. In fact most football lovers do not really “like” to play football, and would rather just watch it. Which is great for business, but not for your diabetes/heart condition.

Likewise in music, one needs to play a musical instrument to start to have access to its open secrets. But that requires effort. And no one wants that.

Music is not really for the masses. Music is for a few. This should not depress anyone. If you are not one of the few (evidenced by the fact that you are not willing to put the effort and enjoy that effort), just do something else. And if you are one of the few, why should you be depressed?

This is like a lot of (religious and otherwise) preachers, constantly demanding that you conform to their beliefs, when in most cases, they themselves cannot live up to it. In fact, it is a sure sign that one cannot live up to one’s beliefs when they start insisting that everyone else should conform to them.

So it is not really a case of liking or disliking music. It is more a case of not wanting to put in the effort. Like the illiterate they cannot understand why they should learn to read. And they never will since this understanding requires your ability to read in the first place.

In short, why should you care if people like music or not, if they want to put an effort towards it or not? It is not really your problem, is it? Concentrate instead in your liking of music, on the effort you are prepared to make towards owning that secret.

It should keep you busy for a while (and busy people do not get depressed).

Best wishes,
Bernhard.

whoa...   time for me to peer into the "mirror".


m1469 

[jeremyjchilds]

I agree that music is not easily enjoyed...there are so many factors involved...

When one considers that the origins of music are (to some degree) religious, music becomes something that transcends simple enjoyment (ex. the way I would enjoy an ice cream cone.) The thought of sitting and meditating for three hours on scripture is not something that I really enjoy, but my humanity and well being is heightened for it. In the same way, Making music is commanded by god in the bible, so that means that we were created for it. Making music stirs our souls and raises us to a higher level as we continue to be odedient.

(I should mention that the next response people will have to what I wrote is "whell what about death metal, does that praise the lord??) My answer is : as a music style, absolutely!! I really enjoy metal. My personal preference is the more techical style!!! As a general philosophy as evidenced by the lyrics...well of course not...some groups feature violent, sexually devient, and suicidal lyrics..that pruposely go against everything in the bible...there is really no doubt that satan would take something created for our well-being and distort in an attempt to destroy us... he has been in the business of counterfiet for years

From an intellectual standpoint, music is just as valuable! I have piano students who come to me because thier parents want them to be doctors when they grow up, and realize that music study is the most important step in getting there. All of us who are teachers know that music study increases spatial reasoning by 17-30 percent...but have we thought about how music re-organizes the brain? Problem solving, delayed gratification, patience and goalsetting The student of music has spent years working through problems that have seemed like they were unsolvable. "I can't get that leap to be accurate....I can't get those scales to be smooth...I can't get those upper voices projected" THe beauty is that a well-guided student will begin to look at those problems as not insurmountable, but begin to look at those problems as simply needing a solution.

Instant gratification is unheard of in music study, If you look at it that way, then you could say that music is one of the few things that stand in the way of our culture workng it's way into innefectiveness. The media promotes easy this simple that...but we are getting fatter even though all of these diets supposedly work fast and easy.
When I first started my business, and the phones were not ringing off the hook, my terrified mind resorted to thinking about the first chopin Valse I tried (posthum.. e-) I could not get the L.H. leaps to be accurate...But I kept going for about a year, among other things, and now i got them...this gave me the patience and faith to believe that if i simply kept at my business, it would suceed.

So, I agree with the person who started this thread...maybe we don't like or enjoy music...

But for me and many others...Music brings me closer to the glory of God, and allows me to reach my intellectual potential.

for that I do not like music, I love music. 

[AvoidedCadence]

I think your friend, if not correct, is certainly on to something.

All around us there are what I call “open secrets”. Knowledge that would of great interest to us and that would definitely be in our best interest to have. From how to heal ourselves from any disease to how to perform the most complicated piece of music. When we hear that such “secrets” exist, we want them revealed to us. And we want them right now. But they are a special kind of secret. They are “secret” not because someone is purposefully hiding them from us, and we depend on this someone willingness to reveal them. They are “secret” because they demand some kind of effort on our part . They are open. They are there for all to see, and yet no oe can be bothered to look.

What keeps music going (classical or otherwise) is not the public. What keeps music going is the performers/creators.

No truer words were ever spoken.

There is a huge amount of people right now quietly playing the piano. They don’t make a big fuss about it, they do not perform in public, sometimes they will not even perform for anyone. They just play for themselves and do not tell anyone about it.

Unfortunately.

... in music, one needs to play a musical instrument to start to have access to its open secrets. But that requires effort. And no one wants that.

Music is not really for the masses. Music is for a few.

Again, completely true.  Just like poetry is for a few, philosophy is for a few ... true knowledge of the human condition is only possible for a few dedicated souls...

This is like a lot of (religious and otherwise) preachers, constantly demanding that you conform to their beliefs, when in most cases, they themselves cannot live up to it. In fact, it is a sure sign that one cannot live up to one’s beliefs when they start insisting that everyone else should conform to them.

So it is not really a case of liking or disliking music. It is more a case of not wanting to put in the effort. Like the illiterate they cannot understand why they should learn to read. And they never will since this understanding requires your ability to read in the first place.

In short, why should you care if people like music or not, if they want to put an effort towards it or not? It is not really your problem, is it? Concentrate instead in your liking of music, on the effort you are prepared to make towards owning that secret.

I love this post perhaps more than any I have ever seen.

I agree that music is not easily enjoyed...there are so many factors involved...

When one considers that the origins of music are (to some degree) religious, music becomes something that transcends simple enjoyment (ex. the way I would enjoy an ice cream cone.) The thought of sitting and meditating for three hours on scripture is not something that I really enjoy, but my humanity and well being is heightened for it. In the same way, Making music is commanded by god in the bible, so that means that we were created for it. Making music stirs our souls and raises us to a higher level as we continue to be odedient.

(I should mention that the next response people will have to what I wrote is "whell what about death metal, does that praise the lord??) My answer is : as a music style, absolutely!! I really enjoy metal. My personal preference is the more techical style!!! As a general philosophy as evidenced by the lyrics...well of course not...some groups feature violent, sexually devient, and suicidal lyrics..that pruposely go against everything in the bible...there is really no doubt that satan would take something created for our well-being and distort in an attempt to destroy us... he has been in the business of counterfiet for years

From an intellectual standpoint, music is just as valuable! I have piano students who come to me because thier parents want them to be doctors when they grow up, and realize that music study is the most important step in getting there. All of us who are teachers know that music study increases spatial reasoning by 17-30 percent...but have we thought about how music re-organizes the brain? Problem solving, delayed gratification, patience and goalsetting The student of music has spent years working through problems that have seemed like they were unsolvable. "I can't get that leap to be accurate....I can't get those scales to be smooth...I can't get those upper voices projected" THe beauty is that a well-guided student will begin to look at those problems as not insurmountable, but begin to look at those problems as simply needing a solution.

Instant gratification is unheard of in music study, If you look at it that way, then you could say that music is one of the few things that stand in the way of our culture workng it's way into innefectiveness. The media promotes easy this simple that...but we are getting fatter even though all of these diets supposedly work fast and easy.
When I first started my business, and the phones were not ringing off the hook, my terrified mind resorted to thinking about the first chopin Valse I tried (posthum.. e-) I could not get the L.H. leaps to be accurate...But I kept going for about a year, among other things, and now i got them...this gave me the patience and faith to believe that if i simply kept at my business, it would suceed.

So, I agree with the person who started this thread...maybe we don't like or enjoy music...

But for me and many others...Music brings me closer to the glory of God, and allows me to reach my intellectual potential.

for that I do not like music, I love music. 

Well these things may be true.  I don't really care.

For me, the simple fact is: music is its own beginning and its own end

I don't know about its beneficial effects on the brain, its corrupting or glorifying effects, or its ability to produce better people.  Words, words, words.  If I were a teacher (which I am not, yet) I might feel compelled to mention these.  But now, all I care about is:

Music is what it is.  And I will listen to it, study it, slave over it, learn it.  No reason is necessary.

[maryruth]

Yes, people who don't like music tend to be the ones who don't understand music...it's fear and insecurity that leads to such statements.  My neighbor once told my husband that he didn't really like music...in fact, he thought music was really a huge waste of time.

Now, I could have been mad about this, but I know this person.  He tends to be a know-it-all and he doesn't like to look stupid.  So, since he doesn't UNDERSTAND music it's easier to call it a waste of time than to admit it's too difficult for him to do.  He only likes things he's good at, unfortunately music isn't one of them.

[tumababa]

Wowwww I was drunk when I wrote that. 

I think the main point I was trying to get across was that I always thought, deep down, people were as into music as I was.  I had never before that moment considered that I was high on the smell of my own farts and that maybe some people just didn't give a damn.  Lesson learned.

Please excuse my ramblings.  I'm shutting up now.

[Barbosa-piano]

 I didn't like any music until I was 12. It is a great feeling for me, when I remember when I got to enjoy classical music. I was on my grandmother's living room, in Brazil, and I was going through some of the CD's in the cabinet. I found this one CD, that really captivated me. It said CHOPIN, Preludes, Mazurkas, Nocturnes, Ballade- Piano Concertos-performed by Ida Cernecka and Marian Pivka. The first music from the Classics that I ever enjoyed: Chopin's Polonaise in C# minor. I didn't know why, but I was attrated to listening to that CD, everytime. It was a great feeling. I guess people just have to be exposed to it, and have their right time for enjoying a music style. If it wasn't for that CD, I probably would not play piano today, maybe not like classical music at all.
 Well, most people like some kind of music, maybe because of the human primitive instinct of dance. I believe that classical music will always captivate people around the world, it has survived so far, contrary to many French popular songs of the 1850's, for example- simply because classical music has a strong message, brought with simplicity.

[pianowelsh]

Music is a vastly complicated and multilayered form of Art that cannot quite ever be defined. It can be and is enjoyed on many levels from very primal instincts to make ordered noise to highly complexed and structured responses. There are very few people who can truely say they DO NOT like music of any sort. Many would admit to a selective taste in music fewer would actively participate in organised music but very few people live in isolation from music. Now they way someone interacts with it can be very different. I dont speak from a condesending or patronising stance.. but from experience that friends and relatives who have dutifully supported my concerts and exams in the passed have come to concerts and have listened (having said they dont like classical music) and at the end said ' i really liked that piece or that bit' i that one had a really nice tune' best yet ive heard them hum bits later on whithout them realising there even doing it!  - now they enjoy it on a relatively unsophistcated level they hear it and retain what they like and subvert the rest... fine i dont have a problem with that! but they get a totally different sense of enjoyment from one of my college peers sitting in the audience who have lots of prior knowledge and experience of the repertoire..  BOTH groups enjoy the music - it resonates with them  but in subtly different ways!

[alzado]

A number of topics and posts have discussed playing for guests in your home.  Perhaps this can fit with the topic, "do people really like music?"

One might be able to establish the inability to listen to even a brief piece of music by trying to play something at a dinner party.

I tried playing two pieces that together took about 8 minutes.  I only see my granddaughters a couple of times a year, and they were visiting my home.  They are about to take music lessons, so I thought that playing something might be encouraging for them.

The session was a nightmare.   I hadn't played two minutes and I heard loud voices, laughing, and jokes.  People were actually shouting to be heard over the piano. 

After I finished and some of the guests had left, my cousin's wife chastized me.  She said, "you really bored people, you know."  Then she named two or three of the listeners by name, who she said had a suffering look, were rolling their eyes and looking at their watches.   

Then she chewed me out for what were such boring and repetitious pieces.  She suggested I learn some popular pieces that are played on the radio a lot, so people could identify with what I was playing.  I told her, "I'm sorry but I do not know 'the Beer Barrel Polka."

What pieces had I played?  The Myra Hess version of "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring" and one section (2.5 minutes) from a rather long piece by MacDowell, "Told at Evening." 

What a tiresome bunch of baboons.   The granddaughters were among the worst.  One had the temerity to actually come up and try to bang on the treble keys while I was playing.

My wife and I discussed the outcome after the guests had left.  We agreed that the woman who had the sheer cheek to "chew me out" will never be invited to our home again.  Never.  Relative or not.  No way, Jose.

One good thing for me is that my wife loves the sound of my playing.  Good thing, because she hears a lot of it.  That's why a good life-partner is worth a whole houseful of lowbrow troglodytes.

[ramseytheii]

A number of topics and posts have discussed playing for guests in your home.  Perhaps this can fit with the topic, "do people really like music?"

One might be able to establish the inability to listen to even a brief piece of music by trying to play something at a dinner party.

The session was a nightmare.   I hadn't played two minutes and I heard loud voices, laughing, and jokes.  People were actually shouting to be heard over the piano. 
...
One good thing for me is that my wife loves the sound of my playing.  Good thing, because she hears a lot of it.  That's why a good life-partner is worth a whole houseful of lowbrow troglodytes.

You have my deepest sympathies Alzado.  I recommend nipping these unfortunate, poorly-bred people in the bud.  And kick them in the Butt on the way out.
It reminds me of a time I was in Germany, talking with some more or less cultured ladies at a small party.  One woman had brought her two teenaged daughters, and in the interest of including them in the conversation, I asked how they liked Chopin.  Well they didn't know who that was.  Out of political correctness I held back my disbelief and explained, he is a composer.  Their response? "Was ist ein Komponist?"
Shocking, but true!

Walter Ramsey