Understanding music?

[longears]

From time to time a poster here refers to "understanding music."  For instance, there's one fellow here who says repeatedly that if you don't agree that composer X is the greatest, then you simply lack his preternatural capacity to "understand" X's music.

What the heck do y'all mean by "understanding music?"  I can understand or recognize a piece's structure, how themes are interrelated and varied, and so on...but "understand music" I cannot do.  I don't see music as rocket science or an instruction manual for programming your VCR DVD recorder iPhone.

Can those who understand so much better than I please explain what you mean by this?

Thanks!

[Florestan]

Good question. I'm interested in an answer, too.

[Kullervo]

I think I know to whom you're referring, and I don't think he knows what it means either.

[Mark]

Surely all 'understanding music' actually means is a comprehension of its technical elements. Is it possible to 'understand' music in a more abstract way?

[Florestan]

Let's put it bluntly, gentlemen: what does it mean "understanding Mahler's 8th?" 

[dtwilbanks]

I don't need to understand music in order to enjoy it.

[Mark]

I don't need to understand music in order to enjoy it.

Quite so.

[Larry Rinkel]

I don't need to understand music in order to enjoy it.

But how can you enjoy it if you don't understand it?

[Florestan]

I don't need to understand music in order to enjoy it.

I'm with Hermann Scherchen: Music shouldn't be understood, but listened to.

[dtwilbanks]

But how can you enjoy it if you don't understand it?

As I understand it, I can enjoy it without understanding it. Understand?

[Larry Rinkel]

As I understand it, I can enjoy it without understanding it. Understand?

No.   As I understand "understanding," unless one understands something - and there are all kinds of levels of understanding, not necessarily "technical" understanding  - one will not enjoy, but will respond to the sounds as if they are simply aural confusion. I say part of the reason you enjoy a piece is that you understand - at some level, whether you have a technical vocabulary or not - the relationships in the piece among its various themes and other processes.

For example, let's say in a Beethoven symphony you enjoy the return of the first theme in the first movement. Your enjoyment is predicated on the fact that you recognize the return of a familiar theme.

The relation between understanding and evaluation is more complex, and not everyone will evaluate a piece of music the same way.

[Renfield]

That is a complicated, difficult, and highly "technical" question in its own right. It concerns the nature of understanding itself, to which people saying they understand something indirectly refer.

And for that reason (though I might return to this thread later, when I've more time on my hands), I shall for the moment point you to Plato, for whom understanding was a sort of assimilation, or acquisition of the deeper truth inherent in an object or notion.

But to be frank, I am going to finally be a very rude person and point out that this - like many threads I make a point of avoiding - is not something we can really discuss here. Or even at all, very possibly!

If you really do want an answer, I invite you to think on it yourself, read a book or two, perhaps write one(!), and you could come to a conclusion. Otherwise, I'll stand with Plato again, on this one: knowledge is acquired, not transmitted. The best someone can do is support another person's acquisition of knowledge; through helping him think, I'll add. But not thinking for him.


Of course, Larry Rinkel's approach also works: cognitive recognition of patterns, etc. But the problem here is that however convincingly one portrays his/her understanding of those patterns, it still takes more than that for another person to "get it".

[dtwilbanks]

No.   As I understand "understanding," unless one understands something - and there are all kinds of levels of understanding, not necessarily "technical" understanding  - one will not enjoy, but will respond to the sounds as if they are simply aural confusion. I say part of the reason you enjoy a piece is that you understand - at some level, whether you have a technical vocabulary or not - the relationships in the piece among its various themes and other processes.

For example, let's say in a Beethoven symphony you enjoy the return of the first theme in the first movement. Your enjoyment is predicated on the fact that you recognize the return of a familiar theme.

The relation between understanding and evaluation is more complex, and not everyone will evaluate a piece of music the same way.

Makes sense to me, Captain. I can enjoy Petre Munteanu's singing voice without knowing what the hell  he's going on about.

[Larry Rinkel]

Makes sense to me, Captain. I can enjoy Petre Munteanu's singing voice without knowing what the hell  he's going on about.

Let's say you can. Would you agree that if you knew the words to Der Atlas or Abschied from the Schwenengesang, your understanding and enjoyment would be enhanced? Or would you disagree? Chances are the only reason you don't know "what the hell he's going on about" is that you don't speak German. What if he sang in English?

[dtwilbanks]

Let's say you can. Would you agree that if you knew the words to Der Atlas or Abschied from the Schwenengesang, your understanding and enjoyment would be enhanced? Or would you disagree? Chances are the only reason you don't know "what the hell he's going on about" is that you don't speak German. What if he sang in English?

Right. I haven't bothered with the translations, yet I listen to his Schubert/Schumann recordings all the time. And of course when I get around to the translations, it will probably kick up the experience a notch.

[cx]

I think many who criticize others for not "understanding [certain] music" are in a defensive position when doing so.

But in the absence of actually explaining one's own "understanding" of the music tells me that "understanding" is not understanding at all. "Understanding" is how one reacts (positively) to the music without understanding why. Otherwise one would have a better explanation for it (other than Vibrational Field Theory, of course).


In other words, I think it's all communication breakdown 

[Bonehelm]

Some people claim that certain "hard to get" composers are bad after the first listening of a "hard to get" piece. That's nonsense and ridiculous. Just 'cause you don't understand complex music and the intentions/ideas of a composer doesn't mean he is bad.

It's just like saying: I don't understand the bible, it's too thick. God must be something bad.

See how stupid it sounds?

[Florestan]

Some people claim that certain "hard to get" composers are bad after the first listening of a "hard to get" piece.

Have you encountered one such on GMG?

[karlhenning]

I think many who criticize others for not "understanding [certain] music" are in a defensive position when doing so.

But in the absence of actually explaining one's own "understanding" of the music tells me that "understanding" is not understanding at all. "Understanding" is how one reacts (positively) to the music without understanding why.

The nature of the understanding is indeed a question . . . .

[Bonehelm]

Have you encountered one such on GMG?

yes, but if I name it someone's gonna get hurt.