# Dunbar's number for pieces of music?



## ZJovicic (Feb 26, 2017)

From Wikipedia:


> Dunbar's number is a suggested cognitive limit to the number of people with whom one can maintain stable social relationships-relationships in which an individual knows who each person is and how each person relates to every other person...


Is there something similar for pieces of music?

How many pieces of music can we have meaningful relationship with?
By meaningful relationship, I mean:

- You can easily recognize the exact piece of music, even if you hear non-famous parts.
- You know the name, the composer, the style/period, the year...
- You know how the piece relates to other pieces by the same composer, and to general music trends of the time
- You know what kind of mood the piece puts you in, you also know what are the times when you most feel like listening to it.
- You can put it in the context of your life story... Like "yeah I discovered that piece back in 1998, when I was exploring Scandinavian composers"... Or "yeah, my ex-girlfriend recommended that piece, and we would often listen to it together"...
- You can recall the piece and are able to whistle large parts of it...
- You can search for it directly on YouTube, and know exactly what you'll get... without the need to rely on lists, recommendations, etc...

*
Dubnar's number is approximately 150.* But it's about meaningful social relations with people.
What the number would be when it comes to meaningful relationships with pieces of music?

I've listened to countless popular songs as well as numerous classical pieces. But I think when it comes to pieces of music (including both popular and classical music), I have such deep, meaningful relationship with, the total number might actually be quite close to 150... or perhaps even a bit lower. It would include around 80% non-classical music songs (popular, folk, etc), and 20% classical pieces.

Among these 150, a significant number would be pieces related to some life events or context in life, stuff that I naturally came across, and maybe smaller number would be pieces which I intentionally got into through intentional personal exploration.

How about you?


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Don't know, but depending how old you are, when you started listening, and what your listening habits have been, I don't think there.s necessarily an upper limit. Trying to theorize one is for bean counters.


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## VoiceFromTheEther (Aug 6, 2021)

ZJovicic said:


> How many pieces of music can we have meaningful relationship with?
> By meaningful relationship, I mean:
> 
> - You can easily recognize the exact piece of music, even if you hear non-famous parts.
> ...


I think the only limit is our lifespan.

Since you have defined your criteria very clearly, I can say that at the moment (age 24) I know at least 200 hours of music in this way.


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## pianozach (May 21, 2018)

VoiceFromTheEther said:


> I think the only limit is our lifespan.
> 
> Since you have defined your criteria very clearly, I can say that at the moment (age 24) I know at least 200 hours of music in this way.


That sounds fairly reasonable. I can say that there are likely a hundred or more (200? Maybe) hours of Pop and Rock music (especially from my teens and 20s) that I "know". Maybe another hundred hours of Classical music.

I imagine that there are folks that can claim to know a thousand hours, maybe two thousand.


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## Kreisler jr (Apr 21, 2021)

This certainly depends on how musically talented (in a very broad way) someone is. Many musicians will know thousands of pieces quite well and be able to play dozens or hundreds by heart. Listeners with good memory might also know thousands of pieces (although not as intimately as most players). When I was about 24-25 I had around 200-300 CDs and I once played a game that my sister would pick a random disc and play a random track and I usually could identify the pieces. Now about 25 years later with several thousands of discs (although lots of repertoire doubling, so probably less than 10 times the music compared to 1997) I might lose more often in such a game but I am quite sure that I would recognize random 30 seconds from many hundreds of pieces. It's easier than with people, therefore the number will often be bigger and vary considerably among listeners. There will also be degrees; there is lots of music I will recognize quickly but couldn't hum or whistle when asked, or some where I would only recognize the composer but not the exact piece etc.


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## 4chamberedklavier (12 mo ago)

That's an interesting question. 

It's much easier to acquaint yourself with a piece of music than with someone else, so I assume the number is greater than 150.

Although I think measuring by the length of the music rather than by individual piece is fairer. I wouldn't assign a 3 minute miniature the same weight as a 30 minute symphony. It takes more time to fully absorb the latter, so measuring by piece would be biased towards shorter works, I think.


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

The number is a meaningless statistic for classical music as the length of a piece can vary tremendously. Going by count, one would say that Wagner's Gotterdammerung (~4hrs30) is equivalent to a 5 minute overture :lol: And, of course, as this wouldn't be a well thought out thread without mention of it, what about Cage's 4'33"?


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## pianozach (May 21, 2018)

Becca said:


> The number is a meaningless statistic for classical music as the length of a piece can vary tremendously. Going by count, one would say that Wagner's Gotterdammerung (~4hrs30) is equivalent to a 5 minute overture :lol: And, of course, as this wouldn't be a well thought out thread without mention of it, what about Cage's 4'33"?


LOL.

Well, yeah, it's tough to compare works of different types. I like Bach's Prelude in C Major, but it's part of the two part Prelude and Fugue, which, in turn, is part of the Well Tempered Clavier Book 1. Are Book 1 & 2 together one single work.

You can do the same with a movement from Vivaldi's four seasons, which are four groups of little symphonettes, but those in the know are aware that the Four Seasons are actually part of a larger work.

Are these all separate pieces, or do they only count as one big epic work?


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## Kreisler jr (Apr 21, 2021)

For keeping the pieces in mind and being able to identify them. I'd count Preludes and Fugues as separate works or at least each pair one work.


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## Monsalvat (11 mo ago)

Consider how much music Herbert von Karajan was able to conduct from memory. He didn't just "know" these scores because he could whistle them, but he knew phrasing, dynamics, articulation, all the details, in his mind. The printed score is a static, unchanging thing (aleatoric music aside) so it is easier to gain a deep familiarity with a written composition than a dynamic, changing social structure such as the one described in the original post. So I would expect that this concept doesn't apply in such a straightforward rule-of-thumb way to music.


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