# Ideas for a listening journal



## sbmonty (Jan 11, 2014)

Hello everyone,

I've been thinking about starting a listening journal and was curious if any of you have any experience with the idea. If so, what form or criteria did you decide upon? I've done a search on the site, but couldn't find a thread on the subject. 

Appreciate your thoughts. Thanks.


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## Eschbeg (Jul 25, 2012)

I used to do something like this. Usually I focused my listening around a small body of works, like the Schubert string quartets or something. I always read along with the score. The journal entry for each piece was nothing big or profound, and consisted simply of a list of observations per movement that struck me as interesting... stuff like "This movement has repeat signs in weird places" or "How strange that a quartet purporting to be in C minor actually ends in B-flat major."


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

I don't keep anything like a dedicated listening journal (not much time for that), but I have recorded bits and pieces about current listening in my ordinary diary. These go back to about 1989/90 so it's interesting to stumble upon them when I look back for dates I want to confirm.
There are entries from the early 1990s where I referred to Ravel as "mawkish and depressing" and Lizst as "excitable twaddle". Now I listen to both and don't have the same opinion. So it's interesting for seeing how your tastes change. However, I called Schubert not very good then and that view hasn't changed all that much...


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## sbmonty (Jan 11, 2014)

Thanks to you both. I think to begin, I'll focus on related bodies of works rather than a daily journal. Unfortunately I cannot read a score quickly enough, so this will be more descriptive in nature. 
Cheers!


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## dismrwonderful (May 5, 2013)

For me such a journal would be an exploration of my responses to a piece of music and an examination of them. I would ask, "Why?" and explore the reasons in the journal where they would be private and I could explore my responses.

Dan


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

sbmonty said:


> Hello everyone,
> 
> I've been thinking about starting a listening journal and was curious if any of you have any experience with the idea. If so, what form or criteria did you decide upon? I've done a search on the site, but couldn't find a thread on the subject.
> 
> Appreciate your thoughts. Thanks.


Do it online, and post it. That way you just might get some interesting responses which may prompt you to dig deeper.

One thing I sometimes have done is to use a book about the music to help me put a structure on what I'm listening. I did that with Bach's Leipzig Chorales, and Machaut's motets. Otherwise it becomes "I enjoyed it" "I was bored" "it's sounds energetic" etc -- which is maybe a bit of a waste of time.


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