How do you balance your listening betwen the genres you enjoy?

[George]

Lately I have been listening to 60s Rock and haven't spent any time listening to classical. In the past, I have been able to balance my listening between my two favorite genres, Rock and Classical, but I have never been able to give enough attention to Rock, Classical and Jazz in a given week. I'd like to have more variety in my listening, but I seem to get drawn into whatever genre I am currently enjoying so much that I ignore the others. I don't necessarily consider this a problem, but I am curious how those of you balance your listening between the genres you enjoy.

   

[Great Gable]

No ingenious plan or device - I follow my mood. Currently I am in a classical mood. It comes and goes - and I just play the music that I feel like listening to. I must add that it never seems to be an exact balance for me - the tide's either in or out.

[George]

No ingenious plan or device - I follow my mood. Currently I am in a classical mood. It comes and goes - and I just play the music that I feel like listening to. I must add that it never seems to be an exact balance for me - the tide's either in or out.

Thanks. 

[71 dB]

I follow my mood too. Lately it's have been mostly classical for me.

[karlhenning]

I follow something like the Great Gable Mood Plan.

In my case, there's much more classical which I enjoy more richly and sustainedly than other genres, so for my listening, the idea of balance incorporates an Overweight Position in Classical Futures 

[Haffner]

George, for me it was intuitive...there have been several points where I rarely picked up Our Music and/or Metal/Rock. But trust me, it definitely balances out. Last summer I just went nuts over Metal again, and I listened to Our Music abot twice a week total. But this only lasted a few weeks. Once I popped in op. 59 again, I was back in a big way.

I always end up missing whatever music I put on the back burner for awhile.

[George]

George, for me it was intuitive...there have been several points where I rarely picked up Our Music and/or Metal/Rock. But trust me, it definitely balances out. Last summer I just went nuts over Metal again, and I listened to Our Music abot twice a week total. But this only lasted a few weeks. Once I popped in op. 59 again, I was back in a big way.

I always end up missing whatever music I put on the back burner for awhile.

Indeed, nothing wrong with utilizing the old "absence makes the heart grow fonder" principle. 

[George]

... the idea of balance incorporates an Overweight Position in Classical Futures 

This is where I had been for about a year or so, but recently have rediscovered some great Rock music from the 60s. As much as I love classical music, Rock has been and will remain my one true love when it comes to music.

[Lethevich]

Having a schizo listening personality helps When somebody mentioned a band in the listening thread earlier, I got such an urge to listen to them that I played an album in the middle of a RVW symphony (I waited for the second movement to finish, then changed disc), then went back to the symphony once the hankering was over.

I go by the mood thing as well (the only option IMO). It tends to remain pretty steady at over 80% classical ~20% other. Non classical can feed a few certain moods that classical cannot, and is also invaluble during a time when I need some kind of beat (eg. working out).

[EmpNapoleon]

Baroque, classical, romantic, and contemporary are all very different from eachother.  I consider each of them a genre, and I jump from one to the other.

You guys have mentioned mood.  The "good music" we listen to is so rich and diverse that it often takes 10 minutes picking out something that fits your mood.  Other times, you need to listen to one thing in particular.  That need is like hunger.

[Haffner]

Rock has been and will remain my one true love when it comes to music.

I'm wondering how adamant you would be concerning that statement if you threw on the Borodin LvB opps. 59 and/or 132 again.

[Haffner]

For me, there's also the nostalgia factor. Rock and Metal tend to "take me back" as well as the Brandenburg Concertos and Paganini's Capricci. Even the Rock and classical music I never liked that much can take me back to interesting memories...

[PerfectWagnerite]

This is where I had been for about a year or so, but recently have rediscovered some great Rock music from the 60s. As much as I love classical music, Rock has been and will remain my one true love when it comes to music.

I hear you man. Nothing beats Metallica for me !

[orbital]

No need for balance here. I listen to whichever whim has me at the moment. That's one big advantage of the high capacity mp3 players 

Admittedly I sometimes force myself to listen to more classical music than I want to at that moment, but it almost never works and I find myself either listening half heartedly, or switching to something else very soon afterwards.

[Brian]

As much as I love classical music, Rock has been and will remain my one true love when it comes to music.

So perhaps your dream band would be Simon and Moravec? I can hear it now: The Boxer's Polonaise!

For Chopin, Wherever I May Find Him...

or maybe that's just *my* dream band.

[Mark]

My listening has altered dramatically since I first discovered classical music at the impressionable age of 18. I began by listening to what Haffner appropriately terms as 'Our Music' only infrequently at first; but with the passing of the years, classical has gained substantial ground, almost completely eclipsing any other genres of music. I say 'almost', because stars like Tori Amos and Kate Bush will forever shine brightly in my own musical firmament.

Last year, the tipping point was reached. I found this forum, and filed away pretty much every disc that wasn't classical. My collection of 'Our Music' has exploded in size thanks to my time here, and now I no longer feel much need to listen to repetitive, four-minute pop/rock songs, however much I might love a good deal of them. Something in me has changed: when I hear an over-produced, closely recorded, non-classical studio album, it sounds artificial, dishonest ... wrong.

And as EmpNapoleon rightly points out, there are plenty enough sub-genres within classical to keep some of us going for the rest of our days. So when it comes to balancing these sub-genres, I'm with those who do it according to mood.

[karlhenning]

Ah! Musica nostra!

[jwinter]

I definitely go in phases, like George, though I almost never go with one type of music 100% of the time -- the big iPod has really made a difference there.  For the past couple of weeks I've been on a Neil Young kick, listening at home, at work, in the car, etc., but just last night I threw in some Chopin Etudes and even some Sinopoli Mahler to break things up a bit.  I'm sort of an omnivore when it comes to this sort of thing.  Same way with books, I'm one of those people who are generally reading half a dozen books at any one time, some I only pick up once a week or so but I keep chipping away at them.

[KevinP]

Long phases and I simply can't listen to a genre if it's not in phase. When I first came to GMG, I did nothing but listen to Bach's Mass and passions with a little branching out, mostly other baroque choral works or instrumental pieces. That's it. I was too into them to even want to listen to other music that I like. Eventually jazz came back into phase and I couldn't listen to Bach again (though if someone asked me what kind of music I listen to, I'd still list him).

I both like and dislike this system, but there's nothing I can do about it. I've tried to listen to out-of-phase music and I just can't. The intense focus on one particular, but ever shifting, genre, is something hard-wired in me.

[marvinbrown]

Lately I have been listening to 60s Rock and haven't spent any time listening to classical. In the past, I have been able to balance my listening between my two favorite genres, Rock and Classical, but I have never been able to give enough attention to Rock, Classical and Jazz in a given week. I'd like to have more variety in my listening, but I seem to get drawn into whatever genre I am currently enjoying so much that I ignore the others. I don't necessarily consider this a problem, but I am curious how those of you balance your listening between the genres you enjoy.

   

  George I can relate to what you are saying about enjoying whatever genre you are listening to that you fixate on it for weeks on end.  I remember weeks where every day I would listen to opera and nothing but  opera!!  But now I force myself (sometimes you have to do that unfortunately) to shift gears and start listening to other types of music.  The key to be successful at this is to pick music you enjoy so much that the transition between genres happens seamlessly. 

  In your particular case might I recommend the Beethoven Sonatas (Gulda) to bring you back to the wonderfull world of classical music.  I hope this helps......

  marvin