Warning: I didn’t proofread or edit this before I uploaded it.<\/p>\n
I had these thoughts long ago when I was discussing my musical tastes with my friends. I was telling them about how I disliked the usual genres of music but I couldn’t really come up with a reason why. <\/p>\n
The other day, while I was washing my sheets, I was listening to Tchaikovsky’s first piano concerto when I realized something. I don’t listen to music from a listener’s perspective–I listen to music from the viewpoint of a performer. I was listening to the concerto and imagining myself playing it in front of a large crowd of people, backed by a professional orchestra. <\/p>\n
In some ways this perspective strengthens your appreciation for the music, but what usually follows imagining performing a piece is imagining practicing it. And if you’ve heard Tchaikovsky’s first piano concerto, you’ll understand why I couldn’t enjoy listening to its recording that night. It’s technical. Dauntingly difficult. <\/p>\n
Yet I went to the Seattle symphony last night and I watched it performed live. The performance was magnificent but I still found myself having trouble enjoying it. Watching a performance live is much different from listening to a recording. Sure, it’s much more glorious, but it’s also much more showing. Instead of listening to the music, I was watching his hands. Instead of being in awe of his skill, I was seething in jealousy and disappointment in myself that it wasn’t me that was up there. The performer is only a year older than me. Will I be up there in a year? Why can’t I be? <\/p>\n
It took me a pretty long time to figure out why I think this way. It’s because I trained myself to do it. Even when I listen to rock and other genres, I’ll imagine myself playing the instruments I hear and I’ll imagine myself playing a solo in front of a million fans. This is probably why I don’t like electronic music or contemporary pop music. Each generation we move further and further away from performable instrumentation in music. <\/p>\n
I look back with a tinge of regret. I wish I hadn’t trained myself only to appreciate music that can be performed. It makes it really difficult to relate to people who listen to pop music. <\/p>\n
But now I’m just rambling. More on this …. some other day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Warning: I didn’t proofread or edit this before I uploaded it. I had these thoughts long ago when I was discussing my musical tastes with my friends. I was telling them about how I disliked the usual genres of music but I couldn’t really come up with a reason why. The other day, while I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1053","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n