The lost art of listening to music Part II

I remember very fondly the Hi-fi set up my Dad used to have in our living room. It had this huge speakers, a nice turntable and cassette deck. My Dad used (I said used because he now seldom listens to music, he lost interest in it) to listen to the mind-blowing arrangements of Ray Conniff, Julio Iglesias' filtered voice and the sharp sound of Herp Alpert trumpet. He used to sit in the middle of the living room, a glass of spirit in his hand, my Mother by his side and those lovely melodies as soundtrack for quality family time.

I still remember the sound of the turntable when the needle hits the surface of the vinyl record. The echoed voice of Julio Iglesias traveling from all corners of the living room while my Mother finished dinner. The level meter bouncing left to right at the rhythm provided by the drum player supported by the lavish and not intrusive electric bass notes and the intrusion of an occasional fretless bass. Music listening was synonym of a good time, it was seldom used to fill the void, when music sounded at home, it was because it was meant to be heard.

At the young age of 8, I began to buy records on my own. My records were not as pleasant as my Dad’s. Lot of classic rock and Glam rock filled my record collection in rapid succession. Not by chance I discovered the wonders of headphone listening. I used to sit on the couch, my Dad’s gigantic closed back headphones on my head while I listened to those records in the dead of night, with the VU meter as the only source of light in the dark living room.

I got to tell you that pretty soon my musical taste expanded, my record collection thrived like mosquitoes in a swamp. I was hooked, music was and still is my trustful companion. How can I put into words what I felt when “Red Barchetta” by Rush really struck? Imagine this young boy all alone listening to the compelling story of a young boy who runs away in his Uncle’s cherished car. There’s no need to argue that Geddy/Neil/Alex instrumentation is top notch. If you know the song, I’m sure you have played air drums to that delightful ride cymbal in the intro and outro on Red Barchetta.

Sure, my Dad’s stereo helped on getting a proper listening experience, music sounded so alive, so real. But then came something that changed the way I listened to music forever. My Dad bought a new Stereo, he was ready to open the doors of his house to the future, and the future came in a shiny format, the CD came to turn things around.

The new stereo had this new strange level meter, long gone are the needles and yellowish lights. Vivid green and red made their pompous appearance at my parent’s house. This was a new experience, music sounded sharper, clearer, the shiny jewel cases started to arrive one by one. Every weekend a new cd was very much welcomed, it was like discovering music for the first time. I began to switch from vinyl to CD’s too, my music collection started to diversify and my first Classical music CD’s started to fill the shelves. Where do I want to go with this aimless rant? Simple, I feel that we’re losing our ability to property listen to music.

This high paced world of ours keep us in a constant state of alert. Our senses are being over-stimulated as the norm. There’s no time to slow down, no time to look around, it’s all about strive for something more. Music has become a supporting actress to our day to day activities, what a shame, music can do so much for our wellbeing.

Thanks to this over-stimulation of our senses, it’s difficult to put our whole attention on a simple task. Just think about this, how many times you grabbed your phone to do a quick search for something and suddenly you realize that more than 30 minutes have gone by?

We need to give back the importance it deserves.

First, we need to fit in our busy schedule a moment to listen to music, nothing else, just listen. There’s no difference in watching a series or reading a book. If you can reserve a moment to do those activities, there’s no shame in spending half an hour or forty-five minutes just listening to your favorite record.

We don’t need to have an acoustic-treated room or top-of-the-line speakers to say that now you got what it takes to proper listen. A pair of good headphones can do wonder in morphing any room into a concert hall. I own a tube headphone amplifier and several pairs of good headphones. An open back pair for Classical and live recordings and a pair of closed back studio monitors when I feel that I need to hear what the sound engineer meticulously carved while mastering.

Make a thoughtful selection in advance of what you’re going to listen. Just like a tourist sightseeing, if we want to know more about the place and its people, we need to get off the bus and start exploring, talk to the bystanders, tastes their food. You need to be more than a tourist and live the whole experience. The same happens to music, read about the artist, about the musical style, the record, how it was recorded, there’s so much to learn, go beyond just a catchy melody.

Another consideration is the fact that we need to educate ourselves. With education you will be able to understand and dissect difficult passages of music or why not, get a full picture on why that short melody is so catchy and appealing to your ear. As an example I’m going to use the music of Neil Armstrong, just to know that he as an individual had to endure the warships of poverty, learned to play trumpet while in prison to later be featured in the cover of Times Magazine. That kind of information bring another layer of depth to what we’re hearing. It happens with classical, pop, country, jazz, it does not matter. To be able to see the big picture help us to understand better what the artist is trying to convey.

To sum things up, I read an Adele interview while she was promoting her latest album, she said: “I want all the streaming platforms to hide their “skip” bottom, in her own words: “We don’t create albums with so much care and thought into our track listing for no reason. Our art tells a story and our stories should be listened to as we intended. Thank you Spotify for listening.”

Album are made to tell a story, relax, let the artist take you on a self-exploratory journey.