# Is this irrational behavior?



## Guest (Mar 21, 2007)

Does anyone else behave the way I do? When a piece of music I love and admire comes on the radio I usually turn it off!

This is because I ration my listening. I am afraid of a piece becomming too familiar thus breeding contempt. In the past I have played pieces to death, then suddenly turned against them and now refuse to listen to them. 

Examples are:-

Emperor Concerto
Pastoral Symphony
Sheherazade

I remember Andre Previn once said that to listen to a piece of music we should have to venture out on a cold wet night, wait in the rain for a bus or taxi to take us to a concert hall and listen to it properly, not turn a knob on a piece of electronic kit to provide instant gratification. 
I guess I feel a bit like this. Listening to the something profound on a car radio with all the other distractions and noise seems direspectful to the composer and performerrs somehow. 

Is anyone else similarly afflicted, and what pieces do you find you can no longer listen to?


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## opus67 (Jan 30, 2007)

dch222 said:


> Does anyone else behave the way I do? When a piece of music I love and admire comes on the radio I usually turn it off!
> 
> This is because I ration my listening. I am afraid of a piece becomming too familiar thus breeding contempt. In the past I have played pieces to death, then suddenly turned against them and now refuse to listen to them.


Yes, I do something like that, too. I don't "refuse" to listen to them, but I just give it a break, so to speak. And when I feel that I've missed a piece for quite sometime, I go and listen to it again.

Beethoven's 6th and 9th symphonies are a couple of examples.


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## Krummhorn (Feb 18, 2007)

Interesting topic - I've never thought much about it until now, and it's entirely possible that I have methodically altered my listening preferences this way without thinking about it. In retrospect, now that the brain is churning over these new thoughts, it's true - during the daytime, as when driving about, I usually listen to background trivial music - at night, particularly on a lonesome road, I will play something that I can really get in to (helps keep me alert, too). 

At home, I rarely have time, or the quiet periods when nobody else is around, to do intent listening, so most of it is done via CD in the car, or like now at the computer, where Rachmaninoff is currently playing. 

Most interesting topic as I said - looking forward to what others have to say. 

Kh


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## opus67 (Jan 30, 2007)

dch222 said:


> I remember Andre Previn once said that to listen to a piece of music we should have to venture out on a cold wet night, wait in the rain for a bus or taxi to take us to a concert hall and listen to it properly, not turn a knob on a piece of electronic kit to provide instant gratification.


Previn's statement is restrcited to Europeans and North Americans. There are the rest of us, who probably would never get a chance to sit and listen to a live concert.


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## Frasier (Mar 10, 2007)

dch222 said:


> Does anyone else behave the way I do? When a piece of music I love and admire comes on the radio I usually turn it off!
> 
> This is because I ration my listening. I am afraid of a piece becomming too familiar thus breeding contempt. In the past I have played pieces to death, then suddenly turned against them and now refuse to listen to them.
> 
> ...


Yes, and I don't think it's irrational because you make your choice based on a comprehension of your behaviour/ likely response. I am somewhat similar. And I utterly hate, for the same reason, hearing works I love become the common currency of the media - like the Adagio from Barber's Quartet Op 11, and the Opening chorus from the Carmina Burana that is now churned out whehever some baleful effect is wanted. I don't regard my hatred as irrational because it can be explained.

I think a lot of creative activities including composing are irrational (because they can't be explained easily) but that's a different story!


E.F


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## fox_druid (Feb 12, 2007)

Well, I also have almostly the same experience as you
Last year, I sticked my ear to Bach's cantata BWV 51 and I played the last Alleluja part over and over for 3 month!

But, now although I always put that Cantata in my iPod playlist, i tend to 'avoid' clicking that song...


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## Kurkikohtaus (Oct 22, 2006)

Nice little observation and idea, *dch222*. I am like you, I listen very rarely to my 3 very favourite pieces of music, perhaps twice a year. But whenever they come up on concert programs in the Czech Republic, I'm apt to travel clear across the country to catch that concert.

I sympathize with Previn's statements, listen to music is very much centered around recordings these days, even in EU and NorthAmerica, where there are plenty of concerts. That said, it's up to conductors to make a point of therefore _not_ recording and getting people to come out to the concert hall.


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## amirjsi (Apr 11, 2007)

Everyone is entitled to strange behaviour, aren't they? 

But in regard to the "turning a knob on some electronic device," it has its fans. And personally I think it helps at least bring classical music to those who otherwise would never have heard of it (like yours truly here).

Some will argue artificiality in recordings and the like, but that's part of the procedure, and you can't help it. Just try to enjoy it for what it is.

But even though you may hear ten versions of a piece of music on your stereo, nothing beats a good live performance; dch222's "under the rain" picture reminded me of the first time I went to a performance of Die Zauberflote.


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## cato (Dec 2, 2006)

This is a very interesting question.  

No, you are not being irrational. Your question however is really food for thought.

Andre Previn has a point, and a disturbing one. Are we becoming "numb" to the musical works we love, by almost treating them as background noise?

I have been guilty of that, and your question also brings up the subject of noise polution. Is it possable that in the 21st century we are losing the ablity to listen, and I mean really "listen" to a work?

Right now, as I type this, I am listening to a new CD of Henryk Gorecki. It's his new string quartet No. 3, Op. 67, with the Kronos Quartet.

I am really enjoying this new work, (buy it, it's wonderful) listening to it as I type...... but...... am I really listening to it? 

In all honesty, with my attention divided, I'm not really giving it the due it deserves. So, after I log off, I'm going to turn down the lights, and give all my attention to this new Gorecki quartet.

Again, great question!


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## Tromboneman (Jan 4, 2007)

i do it to a lot of my music, not just classical. I hate when they play the same song on the radio, and ppl only know that artist for THAT song, lol. I love 311 and they play their most played and crappy songs, even though i love all their songs lol. But ppl only know them for Down and Come Original and its pretty gay cuz their music is so much better than those songs, and its the same thing with most artists, cept rap, i just don't like rap lol, it can go die in a burning house for all i care  lol irrational behavior u ask??? i say nay!


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## Guest (Apr 17, 2007)

A recording (on a CD) always gives the same interpretation. That’s why it is sterilizing.


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## Novelette (Dec 12, 2012)

dch222 said:


> Does anyone else behave the way I do? When a piece of music I love and admire comes on the radio I usually turn it off!
> 
> This is because I ration my listening. I am afraid of a piece becoming too familiar thus breeding contempt. In the past I have played pieces to death, then suddenly turned against them and now refuse to listen to them.


I've always found this feeling difficult to understand. Generating ennui, perhaps, but contempt?; refusal? Strident language. Certainly not saying that this opinion is illegitimate but perhaps it's the obsessive part of me revealing itself inasmuch as I can listen to a single work/composer/etc. very often and over the course of many years without becoming bored by the music.

And to my witty firebrand friends, yes, I was leafing through the dusty archives of TC.  While I may not easily tire of musical repetition, I do quickly become bored with arguments over: modern music, imputing composer's intentions, etc.


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