# Why Do We Listen?



## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

I was listening to a live recording of Ariadne Auf Naxos from Hamburg 1968 and as I was approaching the end of it I was struck by the realisation that I have listened to this opera countless times on different recordings. I have listened to some of these recordings more than once and I like to think I am very familiar, perhaps too familiar, with the work and as such no longer need to read the libretto as I go along. 

The question I asked myself was - why am I continuing to listen to yet another version of this opera? Is it to hear how well the tenor copes with the tessitura of Bacchus' part or how well Zerbinetta copes with her aria? I can admire their singing but I don't feel now that any further listening to this opera will enhance my appreciation of the music or the words or what the combination of both conveys to me. The same can be said of many other works in my collection that I have heard multiple times in my fifty years of listening. I can't think that any new recording of Ariadne will replace my favourite versions so what is to be gained from listening to it. What now am I going to glean from further listening to pieces that I know and love? My fear is that I am now listened out.

So to summarise. Why do we listen to music that we already know albeit interpreted by someone new?


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## Bettina (Sep 29, 2016)

In my opinion, no single performance can capture every detail of a musical work. Every performance (as long as it's good) offers the listener new insights and perspectives. That's why I enjoy listening to many different performances of my favorite works.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Every performance of a work is different, otherwise, conductors would simply copy Toscanini's performances of Beethoven and Brahms "verbatim" and be declared conducting geniuses. It simply can't be done.

I love comparative listening! So many different insights in each of my 7 performances of WTC, 11 performances of the Beethoven Symphonies, etc.

I never get tired of comparing performances of the same music. It is the main way I listen to music.
I wouldn't dream of playing only one performance of a Brahms String Quintet. 

Comparative listening is sooooo fascinating!


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

So basically what we are saying is that there can be no definitive performances of any given work?


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## Bettina (Sep 29, 2016)

Barbebleu said:


> So basically what we are saying is that there can be no definitive performances of any given work?


Yes, that is what I'm saying. Others on TC might disagree, of course. In my opinion, a musical work transcends any single performance, no matter how great the performance is.


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## gardibolt (May 22, 2015)

Sounds about right. I've probably heard Beethoven's Third many hundreds if not thousands of times. But I was just listening to Jordi Savall's rendering of it yesterday and was hearing things in it that I've never noticed before. That's part of why these compositions are great: they're open to a great many interpretations and thus stay fresh.


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## Eddy Rodgers K (Feb 12, 2017)

Barbebleu said:


> So to summarise. Why do we listen to music that we already know albeit interpreted by someone new?


Because this is what we love, and we always want more.


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## Meyerbeer Smith (Mar 25, 2016)

I'm puzzled by comparative listening. I'd rather hear an opera I don't know than sixteen different performances of the same work. Why listen to yet another Ring cycle or _Barber of Seville_ when I could listen to Février's _Monna Vanna_, Cras's _Polyphème_, Napravnik's _Dubrovsky_, Shaporin's _Decembrists_, Serov's _Judith_, Franchetti's _Germania_, Marchetti's _Ruy Blas_ or Kreutzer's _Nachtlager in Granada_?


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## mountmccabe (May 1, 2013)

If only there were a thread wherein people discussed the value and joys of comparative and/or repetitive listening.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

I like multiple recordings of the same opera because when I am that crazy about a particular opera, the variety in each recording makes things more interesting and keeps a single recording from getting stale. Different levels of sound quality, different vocalists, live vs studio, all adds to the variety that makes it more interesting than a single recording. Often I will hone in an a single recording as my favorite, but that can change over time.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Opera is difficult to perform, great singers are in short supply, and it's hard to find a recording satisfactory in all respects. If you've the time and the money, why not keep pursuing the impossible ideal?


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## lluissineu (Dec 27, 2016)

Bettina said:


> In my opinion, no single performance can capture every detail of a musical work. Every performance (as long as it's good) offers the listener new insights and perspectives. That's why I enjoy listening to many different performances of my favorite works.


I can't Imagine having just a recording of The pieces I like. Just as it was said in another thread, Beethoven's 9th by Klemperer or Furtwängler Is on the one hand The same music as The Szell or Chailly recordings, but on The other hand it Is very different. I can enjoy all of them, depending on many factors, but mainly in my mood.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

mountmccabe said:


> If only there were a thread wherein people discussed the value and joys of comparative and/or repetitive listening.


You can always start one.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

I'm intrigued by the premise that there can be no definitive performance of a given piece of work. A performance given by the composer must be near the ideal provided that the composer himself adheres to his/her own directions with regard to tempi, markings etc. As an example I would cite Britten's own recording of Peter Grimes. A hand-picked cast, a chosen orchestra and the composer himself in charge who also happened to be a first rate musician and conductor himself. Would this interpretation, which I assume fulfils the composers intentions, not be considered a definitive performance of this work and all other interpretations, provided they are faithful to the composer's instructions, would aspire to this level of performance. If they are not doing this then what is the point they are making and in what way are they adding to our knowledge and enjoyment emotionally or intellectually of this work? I agree that in light of there being no absolute performance of any piece then performers are at liberty to do their best but only, I think, if they are giving fidelity to the composers own instructions because surely the composer is attempting to get some message across to the listening audience.


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## Morton (Nov 13, 2016)

This certainly isn't the definitive performance of Peter Grimes for me, I much prefer Jon Vickers to Peter Pears in this role.
I saw Stuart Skelton sing Grimes a few years ago in a fine production at ENO and again I preferred his take on the role to that of Pears.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

But the composer wrote the part of Grimes specifically for Pears. I assume he expected Pears to get to the heart of the part thereby revealing the composers intentions. My point is about a work in its entirety not specific singers in particular rôles. I expect the composer to know more about what he expects or expected to achieve than someone fifty years down the line.


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## mountmccabe (May 1, 2013)

Can we reasonably consider a studio recording (assuming that's the one you mean) of an opera to be definitive? I think it's fair to consider that recording important, and a classic, but I wouldn't call it definitive. (I would have the same answer even if it were a live recording. Even if it were a live recording from the first performance).

I see an opera as bigger, as something more than any single performance. In this one, I think Vickers shows us something different than Pears does. And thankfully, it is not one or the other. We can have both, and can consider both to be valid.


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## mountmccabe (May 1, 2013)

Barbebleu said:


> But the composer wrote the part of Grimes specifically for Pears. I assume he expected Pears to get to the heart of the part thereby revealing the composers intentions. My point is about a work in its entirety not specific singers in particular rôles. I expect the composer to know more about what he expects or expected to achieve than someone fifty years down the line.


Even more, Pears was involved in the creation of the opera. He and Pears conceived it from reading Crabbe's poems, they picked Slater to write the libretto, and collaborated with him on adapting the story.

The Britten-Pears performances and recordings may be the closest to the composers intentions, but even there, variety exists. In addition to the studio recording from 1958, we have the BBC film from 1969, with Britten and Pears, but otherwise a different cast and orchestra. And neither of these are the original performance, or even the first recording. I don't know any of several recordings with Pears beyond the '58 Decca set; can anyone speak as to how his interpretation changed over the 20+ years he sang the role?

Personally, I do not think an author has the last say on their work. Intentions are important and should be considered, but we each will interpret things different since we are individuals, with different preferences, feelings, and experiences. And, again, I see opera as larger than any one performance, interpretation, expression. I don't think the composer (or librettist, or other original creative team) will necessarily see everything there is to their work; they do not know the ways in which it will be read.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

I'm really only trying to play devil's advocate here. I was questioning my own reasons for listening to yet another version of an opera I know well and wondering what, if any, further insights were being provided. I suppose there is a never ending quest for an elusive something that leaves you thinking - yeah, that's the one, don't need any others. Don't really think that will happen though. 

As for the idea that the composer doesn't have the last say on a work I'm not sure I can totally agree. Why on earth would you compose or write something that didn't say exactly what you intended and would be happy for someone to reinterpret it to their requirements?


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

-- Every performance of anything is a compromise, so there's always a chance you'll hear something that you didn't before, or hear something interpretively that makes you think or alters your conception of a piece.

-- There is, however, the possibility of going overboard and over-obsessing about it. It's possible to find one or two performances that you are comfortable with and delimit what you think is the point, and stick with them. No harm in that, especially as you get older and just want to enjoy.

-- All performances, however well thought out -- even conducted/supervised by the composer -- are "of the moment," subject to compromises based on cast and conditions, and the composer's state of mind (which is subject to change over time).

-- Artists aren't always the best interpreters of their own work. Witness most of the recordings you have heard of poets reading their own poems.

-- Of course, I don't read music very well, but I have a bunch of scores I occasionally look at, because I will sometimes see things I don't hear, or see things that make what I do hear make sense.


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## Bettina (Sep 29, 2016)

MarkW said:


> Artists aren't always the best interpreters of their own work. Witness most of the recordings you have heard of poets reading their own poems.


Yes, this is often true. Debussy's piano roll recordings are a case in point. Pretty shaky playing--and it can't all be blamed on the inferior technology. Similarly, when Stravinsky conducted some of his own works (often many years after having composed them), the results were frequently disappointing, at least in my opinion. A bit too fast and mechanical for my taste.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

MarkW said:


> -- Every performance of anything is a compromise, so there's always a chance you'll hear something that you didn't before, or hear something interpretively that makes you think or alters your conception of a piece.
> 
> -- There is, however, the possibility of going overboard and over-obsessing about it. It's possible to find one or two performances that you are comfortable with and delimit what you think is the point, and stick with them. No harm in that, especially as you get older and just want to enjoy.
> 
> ...


I pretty well agree with everything you say here but I'm still in a quandary about at which point the chase is not worth the candle and say you have found a couple of interpretations that meet most of your expectations, is that a reason to stop pursuing the, probably, unattainable and focus your attention on those interpretations in an attempt to glean as much from them as you can. Sorry for the rather long-winded para there!


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## Buoso (Aug 10, 2016)

I think my favourite story in regard to a composers ideal for their opera and a different interpretation is this one. A composer once remarked of one particular conductor "although he is an excellent musician of the other school – that is, the modern school – he can't, and does not know how to, conduct my music". On reflection this particular composer may be viewed as somewhat incorrect in this assumption (at least to posters here) as a recording by the conductor (referred to in the quote) of one of the composers operas is not only considered to be by wide consensus as the greatest recording of that opera but is also considered one of the greatest recordings of any opera by any conductor! That recording being of course the 1953 Tosca with Victor De Sabata with the displeased composer Giaccomo Puccini!


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## Eddy Rodgers K (Feb 12, 2017)

Buoso said:


> I think my favourite story in regard to a composers ideal for their opera and a different interpretation is this one. A composer once remarked of one particular conductor "although he is an excellent musician of the other school - that is, the modern school - he can't, and does not know how to, conduct my music". On reflection this particular composer may be viewed as somewhat incorrect in this assumption (at least to posters here) as a recording by the conductor (referred to in the quote) of one of the composers operas is not only considered to be by wide consensus as the greatest recording of that opera but is also considered one of the greatest recordings of any opera by any conductor! That recording being of course the 1953 Tosca with Victor De Sabata with the displeased composer Giaccomo Puccini!


But Puccini died in 1924.

EDIT: Oh now I get what you mean. Nevermind.


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

Why do I go on watching different productions of Shakespeare plays (when I can)?

No matter how well I know _Hamlet_, and no matter how pleased I might be with one cast's performance, I will always discover something new with a new production, and even if I come away convinced that the director or actor had the wrong approach, it has still deepened my knowledge of the play.

It would certainly be nice if I could see a play I never have before, such as _Cymbeline_, but if you love a work, you don't get tired of seeing it again.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

Absolutely. I just downloaded yet another Tristan! Salzburg 1972 with Vickers, Dernesch, Ludwig, Riddersbusch and Karajan. The same cast that he used for his studio version.

Btw favourite Shakespeare play that I can watch again and again is Richard III.


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## znapschatz (Feb 28, 2016)

A composer is not necessarily the best interpreter of his/her own composition. Some can, but I’ve never heard a work of his conducted by Rachmaninoff, for example, that was as well realized as that of almost any of the great conductors. Conducting is a special skill, equal to that of any artist, and those who specialize in that discipline could well be more qualified to bring out the nuances in a work that a composer cannot. Music is a colaborative effort. Once a composer releases a completed work, it becomes the “property" of the whole world, subject to the perceptions of whoever interprets it, and sometimes that can deviate from the composer’s ideal. The end result to the listener is what counts most. We’re all in this together.


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## znapschatz (Feb 28, 2016)

Ingélou said:


> Why do I go on watching different productions of Shakespeare plays (when I can)?
> 
> No matter how well I know _Hamlet_, and no matter how pleased I might be with one cast's performance, I will always discover something new with a new production, and even if I come away convinced that the director or actor had the wrong approach, it has still deepened my knowledge of the play.
> 
> It would certainly be nice if I could see a play I never have before, such as _Cymbeline_, but if you love a work, you don't get tired of seeing it again.


Another _Hamlet_ nut here, best play ever written by anyone, ever, in my fanboy opinion. I love it too much because I get frustrated when a performance gets things "wrong." And that happened the first time I ever saw it, with Nicol Williamson in the title role! Yeah, delusional, but that's how it is with me  . The same with _Boris Godunov_, but that's a subject for another post.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Anent composers and their own works: I've heard that William Walton, attending a performance of one of his own works, always went backstage and told the conductor that that was the best he'd ever heard it. When challenged by an acquaintance who'd caught him doing so several times, Walton replied "That way they'll play it again."


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## pcnog11 (Nov 14, 2016)

Barbebleu said:


> So basically what we are saying is that there can be no definitive performances of any given work?


Absolutely, the beauty of music is the interpretation of a piece. Some performer are more adhere to the score, some are not. I have listening session that compare the some piece with the different performer. My last one was on Mendelssohn VC, wonderful experience. My next project is comparing Tchaikovsky PC no. 1.

I think we listen for our own pleasure to resonance with emotions, purity to stir the soul. Everyone is different, what is yours?


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## Meyerbeer Smith (Mar 25, 2016)

znapschatz said:


> Another _Hamlet_ nut here, best play ever written by anyone, ever, in my fanboy opinion. I love it too much because I get frustrated when a performance gets things "wrong." And that happened the first time I ever saw it, with Nicol Williamson in the title role! Yeah, delusional, but that's how it is with me  . The same with _Boris Godunov_, but that's a subject for another post.


Isn't it? My favorite production is the Branagh film - the full, uncut, five hour version - although I prefer Jacobi. (I haven't seen Gielgud, and I find Olivier too mannered.)

Unfortunately, the last _Hamlet _I saw live... Hamlet was an ADD-ridden man-child, hard to picture as the introspective philosophy student of Wittenberg.* This seems to be the fashion, ever since David Tennant's irritating performance. This one masturbated and mimed oral sex with a puppet of his uncle's head, and clambered up walls and mooned the audience. He also made a hash of the soliloquy; he stumbled and lurched his way through the lines, having apparently forgotten his advice to the players to pronounce them trippingly on the tongue.

*: True, Olivier's 'man who could not make up his mind' and the Romantic conception of Hamlet as a man entirely meditative and incapable of action, are at odds with the athletic prince who duels, hangs about with actors, fights pirates, and would drink up eisel and eat crocodiles.

It was set in a modern fascist state, of course. The ghost was a tubby, topless middle-aged man wearing track pants, not the spectre in complete steel whose lightest word harrows up souls and freezes young blood. Polonius waved around a condom. The death scene was played for laughs, Hamlet jerking and thrashing around on the floor like a landed fish.

Unsurprisingly, the critics loved it.


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## znapschatz (Feb 28, 2016)

SimonTemplar said:


> Isn't it? *My favorite production is the Branagh film - the full, uncut, five hour version - although I prefer Jacobi. (I haven't seen Gielgud, and I find Olivier too mannered.)*


Me, too! Glorious! Some issues with minor character actors who basically did guest star turns, but otherwise wonderful.



> Unfortunately, the last _Hamlet _I saw live... Hamlet was an ADD-ridden man-child, hard to picture as the introspective philosophy student of Wittenberg.* This seems to be the fashion, ever since David Tennant's irritating performance. This one masturbated and mimed oral sex with a puppet of his uncle's head, and clambered up walls and mooned the audience. He also made a hash of the soliloquy; he stumbled and lurched his way through the lines, having apparently forgotten his advice to the players to pronounce them trippingly on the tongue.
> 
> *: True, Olivier's 'man who could not make up his mind' and the Romantic conception of Hamlet as a man entirely meditative and incapable of action, are at odds with the athletic prince who duels, hangs about with actors, fights pirates, and would drink up eisel and eat crocodiles.
> 
> ...


Do the producers think they have to flog a dead horse, or something? How stupid do they think their audiences are? Critics who support suchlike should stick to teenage oriented action films where their sensibilities belong. :scold:


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## Jacred (Jan 14, 2017)

It's as simple as different versions having different strengths. When you lay various interpretations one on top of another, you see all the strengths at once and combine them to get a fuller sense of the music. That and, as originally mentioned, it's interesting to see how different performers handle different parts of the music once you have an idea of what to expect.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Another filet mignon? Well, I guess I'll eat it, even though I had one last month...


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Barbebleu said:


> I pretty well agree with everything you say here but I'm still in a quandary about at which point the chase is not worth the candle and say you have found a couple of interpretations that meet most of your expectations, is that a reason to stop pursuing the, probably, unattainable and focus your attention on those interpretations in an attempt to glean as much from them as you can. Sorry for the rather long-winded para there!


At the point at which it becomes an obsession.  (Although I can sympathize. I have collected every new performing version of Mahler's Tenth that gets recorded. First, because there's no "definitive" version possible, and second because of problems I've had with Cooke's that I would like to see dealt with.)


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## bharbeke (Mar 4, 2013)

Why are there 1,000 versions of "Yesterday" by The Beatles?

If the quest is for a version that you can return to again and again that has most of the features you like in the music, then you can stop at some point. If you just enjoy hearing the song/piece and are willing to be pleasantly surprised by something new in the music, then it never hurts to hear "just one more" version.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

It's like any "reading" of a script by an actor. A good actor will infuse meaning into the words, another may simply read-through the words mechanically.

Glenn Gould gave Bach's Sinfonia No. 9 profound meaning by playing it slower, and lingering on it. Other pianists simply breezed through it.


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