# Does anybody find themselves shifting in "genre" preference?



## Cnote11 (Jul 17, 2010)

I've always been a big symphony buff, yet these days I hardly find myself listening to them. At least not at the rate I used to listen. These days I have really gravitated towards music for solo instrument, chamber, choral, songs, and opera. Typically, it seems like concertos, symphonies, and sonatas get the bulk of listening by classical music listeners. Has anybody seen their preference of style shift slowly over the years as well?


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## Dodecaplex (Oct 14, 2011)

I used to listen to diverse music like you, then I took a 5-hour opera and a Mass in B minor to the ears.


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## Cnote11 (Jul 17, 2010)

Leave it to Dodie to use a variation of that joke on talkclassical.


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## Dodecaplex (Oct 14, 2011)

That is only my second time doing such a thing. 'Onest.


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Not shifting, but expanding. I used to not be so much into vocal music (opera, lieder, choral), now I love it.


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## Dodecaplex (Oct 14, 2011)

Ono tiki malo shaka
Ono tiki malo shaka
Ono tiki malo shaka
Ono tiki malo shaka

Cnote is a good man. I'm sure he will understand.


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## ProudSquire (Nov 30, 2011)

I find myself all over the place, one minute I'm listening to a symphony the next could be an opera, or a concerto for solo instrument. Albeit, lately I've been enjoying a great deal of chamber music. There seems to be less time for me to listen to music!


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## Badinerie (May 3, 2008)

Once I'm in the Classical music mood, usually Spring through Summer, I listen to the whole spectrum. In the winter I do tend to listen to cool Jazz and Classic Rock and Blues more. I must have Musical S.A.D.!


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## TheBamf (Apr 21, 2012)

I have in recent years listened to a lot of metal, namely BM/DM/TM but just a few weeks ago I experienced an adrupt change in my listening habits. For now, I almost exclusively listen to classical, with metal being a side thing for when I excersice or I can not occupy my self with the music.


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## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

I regularly listen to a mix of classical, jazz, country western, folk, pop vocals, big band, opera, novelty, easy listening, R&B, library music, the blues, Latin music, rock and roll and soul. I use smart playlists in iTunes to keep it all moving.


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## Chrythes (Oct 13, 2011)

I think I'm a bit like Violadude right now. I used to listen mostly to Chamber music, but lately I've found out about Mahler and Dvorak's symphonies 7-8 (also choral works seem to be more accessible for me now than before), so even though I might be listening more to symphonies these days, I'm infact expanding my range of music.


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## Polednice (Sep 13, 2009)

The ensembles I prefer have always been roughly correlated with the time of day, so I've always listened to a fairly even spread, excepting opera which I hardly ever listen to except a special handful.


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## Stargazer (Nov 9, 2011)

For a while I was pretty much exclusively into piano sonatas. Then I went into piano concertos, string quartets....now I'm in a symphony/song phase, I'm sure it'll be something else in a month or two!


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

I suppose I have a genre preference... Modern and Baroque and Sturm und Drang classical.


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

I don't so much shift between genres as set aside certain others - I've been very guilty of neglecting my opera collection over the last few months. Tosca was the next one I was due to play and it's been sitting near the player for ages making me feel guilty.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> I suppose I have a genre preference... Modern and Baroque and Sturm und Drang classical.


I'm basically with you there, except my modern tastes are more conservative than yours.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

Sometimes though, I go through phases where I'm into the Romantic much more. 

And I can't ever decide if I'm truly a clavichorder, or more of a piano guy.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

clavichorder said:


> Sometimes though, I go through phases where I'm into the Romantic much more.
> 
> And I can't ever decide if I'm truly a clavichorder, or more of a piano guy.


But do you have a *clavichord*?


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## ScipioAfricanus (Jan 7, 2010)

my first Genre that I was totally in love with was the Piano Concerto. After that I shifted to the Symphony, then to chamber and Opera.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

aleazk said:


> But do you have a *clavichord*?


I actually do. To be honest, its borrowed though. but I've had it for a year.


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## Badinerie (May 3, 2008)

I borrowed my mate's Clavichord for two years. It was the the only way I could stop him playing the bloody thing (  )


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## tgtr0660 (Jan 29, 2010)

I listen to everything but my preferences haven't changed really.


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## Moira (Apr 1, 2012)

I have broadened my tastes in music over the years. Currently I'm also listening to jazz which was not a genre I listened to in the past.


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## kv466 (May 18, 2011)

While I have always tried to mix things up as much as possible, I have mostly always gravitated toward the concerto; primarily the piano variety. Lately, however, what I find myself hearing most often are works ranging from one to eight players. Lots of septets and octets and many quartets and quintets along with everything else in between and around.


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## Argus (Oct 16, 2009)

Of course. I have 'phases' where I really get into one kind of music but I still listen to other stuff, just not as much. Right now I am in a electronic/dance music phase, which means I want drum machines and sequencers more than violins and guitars. Other phases from the past include the indie phase, the classic/prog rock phase, the jazz phase, the classical phase, the hip hop phase, the experimental phase, the ambient phase and the world/folk/roots phase.

I am also kind of in a pop renaissance.


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## opus55 (Nov 9, 2010)

I started with concertos and symphonies. Then I got into chamber music it felt like I discovered a gold mine.


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## Arsakes (Feb 20, 2012)

Chrythes said:


> I think I'm a bit like Violadude right now. I used to listen mostly to Chamber music, but lately I've found out about Mahler and Dvorak's symphonies 7-8 (also choral works seem to be more accessible for me now than before), so even though I might be listening more to symphonies these days, I'm infact expanding my range of music.


Like you I listen to many genres like J&B, Country, World folk music like Greek and Latin .. even traditional Chinese and Persian. I just can't stand the high use of Electric Instruments specially Guitar. So everything heavier than Rock & Roll really annoys me!

But for me it hasn't changed: Late Romantic for the world


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

Like violadude I would say expanding. I have recently gotten into opera much more (compared to essentially none). I also have greatly expanded the vocal music I listen to. I still listen to the genres I used to listen to, but I have found new loves as well.


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## SimonH (Jul 18, 2010)

violadude said:


> Not shifting, but expanding. I used to not be so much into vocal music (opera, lieder, choral), now I love it.


Yep, expanding for me too. First it was just symphonic stuff. Then there was opera. At some point I fell in love with sacred music. Minimalism... and so on it goes on.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

I've done the complete shift from all-orchestral to all piano to all string quartets, then all-sacred. Now I've ended up into just about everything.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

"Sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don't"

Sure. Even older geezer professionals can and do have their 'whims.' If you are younger (I know you are) it is inevitable that one genre, period, composer, will seize your attention and imagination for some length of time, then another. Tastes for, or in, various genres can go like that too.

There is a 'standard' progression for the average listener, big orchestral romantic works, then perhaps back to the classical era, eventually chamber orchestra or the much reduced and refined arena of a handful of instruments in the form of a good deal of chamber music. Voice gets introduced, often not opera, but Lied or oratorio, or the great choral works.

I recall going on a lieder kick in my teens which had me dropping all the Prokofiev, Stravinsky etc. orchestral works and piano concerti and instead I was eyebrow deep in Schubert's "Winterreisse" - the first full Dietrich Fischer-Diskau / Gerald Moore recording. At one point, without knowing German, I had nonetheless memorized a number of the texts - just like any other teenager knows the words to the pop music songs they play so repeatedly (...romanticism's lugubriousness suits adolescent moodiness, lol.) Of course, they were 'new' to me, therefore a very profound and 'oh wow' discovery.

There are times I don't want to hear a full orchestra playing anything from any period, other times I do.

I think it is pretty 'average,' the younger you are and still in 'explore' mode (may that never leave you!) but with such mountains of repertoire to go through, it is 'the way to go.'

People who do listen like this are usually the ones who, to some fuller level, really want to 'get' what is going on in that genre, with that composer, so will stay there until that is at least partially satisfied.

[Every time you post a similar question, I read between the lines -- and could be entirely mistaken -- that you are wondering if 'that is alright - or normal.' I'd say stop checking yourself that way; I wonder what it does, at all, for you.]

There are, for academic purposes of learning, several proscribed sequences of what to listen to and in what order, or comparative side-by-side listening to / examination of two or several works, each illuminating some aspect of the other. Those are presented in academe, and knowing you have a piano / comp instructor, would simply ask them if you are wishing to examine anything in that manner, if that is a present concern.

For your general sense of exploration and discovery, you only might want to ask yourself 'why' one or another genre is appealing to you at the moment to the purpose of defining a general quality that genre possesses which attracts, i.e. what characteristic differences in the kind of music is appropriate to it. That is not only interesting, but very useful to have defined if you are thinking of composing. Certain ideas will be more readily recognized as best cast in X genre vs. Y. genre. A fundamental idea may best be manifest for a chamber ensemble vs. a chamber symphony or full orchestra, for example.


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## Cnote11 (Jul 17, 2010)

If your post was aimed at me PetrB: 

No, no. This isn't a question where I ask "Do other people do this as well?", I'm just curious to what other people do. I'm studying for my masters in social psychology so I'm naturally curious to observing people and their opinions and behavior! 

Regarding my original post, I feel that I've come really to like enjoy the other forms more than the symphony. I still do like symphonies, but they are no longer my favorite and I don't honestly see them ever becoming again.

I also strongly agree with your last statement. I tell people that all the time. For myself, if I'm being honest, there isn't that much I don't like. I love, basically, all genres of music. My collection of records is in the 5-digit range. I really, really love Modern Classical, which has seen a reduction in symphonies, so naturally as I got heavier into modern classical throughout the years my listening of symphonies kind of dropped off... but at the same time, naturally as I get older, I begin exploring composer's catalogues much more thoroughly and find smaller works in various genres.

Although I'm not sure if your post is actually aimed at me. I don't typically post these things (perhaps the Stockhausen one, but again I just wanted to see people's opinion on it out of interest), and I most certainly do not have a piano instructor. You've said various things to me throughout me being here that make me wonder if you're mixing me up with someone else :lol:


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