Music and the Work

I didn't see the anime, I only discovered the soundtrack when I looked up the composer of some other music I liked. The picture could have influenced anyone, it irritates me and clashes with the music so I don't look at it.

I think our interpretations agree on a few points:

1: There is an element of reflection and moving into the present.
2: A peaceful sense of "everything in it's place".

I think the discrepancy is that I seemed to focus on the ominous tones and give them more weight. To me the track is moving from anxiety through relief and peacefulness whereas for you it seems peacefulness covers most of the track. The ominous tones are a very small part of the track but still part of the "narrative", so I did focus on them.
 
Music can be/is a part of our hypnosis; our sleep. If the aim is to awaken, we need to look carefully at our musical choices. Do I like "X" because it supports me in awakening, or do I like it because it appeals to my desire to remain asleep? Does a particular piece of music hook me in a blind spot? Am I willing to be objective about music which expresses the A influences, even if it sounds good to me? How rigorous am I willing to be with myself?
 
You can't say that a rock is good or evil. Most music to me is like rocks of varying types and properties. Even trance music does not in itself cause dance parties. There are plenty of people who are bored by it and just turn it off. Most people seem to agree that marble is a desirable rock when used in furniture. And granite is so common and unremarkable that you just drop it and walk away. But we can't say that marble is the "cosmic furniture rock". Just because we use it that way doesn't mean that's what it IS.

I suspect that music without overt messages has an informational level below that of language and communication. Most voiceless music has obvious emotional meanings, and while most people seem to interpret them similarly at a very basic level, above that level they experience them in different ways.
 
monotonic said:
I suspect that music without overt messages has an informational level below that of language and communication. Most voiceless music has obvious emotional meanings, and while most people seem to interpret them similarly at a very basic level, above that level they experience them in different ways.
Click to expand...

I agree with the assessment. Music is a language and knowing how to decode the language is important.
Two of my all time favorite movies are "Amadeus" (kind of funny) and "My immortal beloved". Both are semi-fictions, not real biographies. In "My immortal beloved", there is this scene:


https://youtu.be/4ZlC-7KaZk0

Music can be perceived at three levels: physical, emotional and intellectual. Most of beat music (at 120 to 140bpm, matching the heart rate in its excited mode) goes to the physical level. One wants to dance and nothing more. Other music has some mathematical beauty in it, it talks to the intellect, especially if one has some rudimentary knowledge in music theory. Some music can talk to the emotions, which is very different than sentimentality, which one can consider as a superficial projection of emotions onto the music. This latter often happens when one listens passively to music, and do not invest actively in deciphering what the message of the music is about. If the music touches the three aspects at once, motor, intellectual and emotional, which depends on the receptivity on the listener at that exact moment in time, then something really deep happens. Music alone does nothing, it is its interaction with the listener that matters.

The active listening to music IMHO involves the simultaneous understanding of the music being listened to, and of the internal processes being moved by it, the how and why. OSIT
 
One can be attentive while listening but that does not necessarily mean they will see something new. One thing I've noticed is that people here like to say "do it consciously" a lot, in different ways. But to simply pay a lot of attention is not enough. Most of the time when I am able to achieve something it is because I have a plan or have special knowledge, or a special method which I can apply while observing. Without these things it's unlikely that I will observe anything more than variations and nuances on what I had already seen. So I think part of doing it consciously is to have knowledge which you can apply while doing it.

This keeps reminding me of an old thread of mine:

https://cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php/topic,23595.msg261537.html#msg261537

Seems like a start on the concept of "active listening". Perhaps it could be improved.
 
I remember that thread indeed. You may notice that I didn't use "attentive" or "conscious" because of the ambiguity that may result from those word in this context ;)
"Active" may be the beginning or something "conscious" though. The extreme of passive listening would be to have music in the background while we have our attention on something else, so maybe one can at least start from there.

Understanding is an important key to the process. However, I don't think at this point that there are universal recipes that work the same way for everyone, same as with knowledge. There may be some shared experiences at some basic level: For example, we can agree that the sound of birds singing in the trees is enjoyable for most people. One first-order explanation would be that it has its root in some deep-rooted association: birds sing = no dangerous predators around = safety. However, the sound of thunder is enjoyable to some, and terrifying for others. In this case it relates to emotional associations and psychological "structure". For some people, the resolution of a more dissonant into a more consonant chord in a piece of music inspires the same relief as a the sound of thunder, it's like the release of a tension. Music is not just chord progressions, it's a blend of many elements, and the level of "analysis" (not limited to intellectual and conscious level) depends on each, in comprehension, complexity, and state at the moment. OSIT
 
Here is something I wrote down a while back. I don't know anything about this song except it's a remix of a videogame tune and the names of the other tracks in the album. I didn't identify with the tune but I thought it was interesting how there seemed to be a clear message. Obviously, this will be colored through my lens, but that's better than not sharing anything at all. The narrative I supply makes me feel similar emotions to what I feel as the music is playing - the intent is not to find an intellectual narrative and I'm not sure there is one. And I have again hidden my interpretation so you don't have to worry about it giving the track a narrative before you listen.

https://soundcloud.com/kumagames/b4-villa-richards-villa



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Villa (Richard's Villa) from OCRemix

Start Here with you I am at peace
0:26 I would never speak harshly to you
0:46 Amidst the darkness, I will keep you safe and protect you from harm
...
1:35 That we can't be together -
2:15 the irony
1:40 I am lonely without you
2:00 In your absence, I am afraid
2:22 Despite the distance, I will keep you dear
End My home is where you are

Can an instrumental express neediness? This one seems to, but as though the composer doesn't see it as neediness.
 
Came across this today:

The type of music you like can provide an insight into the way you think, new research finds.

People who like more mellow, unpretentious music, like the following tracks, are more likely to be empathisers:

Hallelujah — Jeff Buckley
Come away with me — Norah Jones
All of me — Billie Holliday
Crazy little thing called love — Queen

Empathisers are more people-oriented and focus on the emotions of others.

Typical occupations for empathisers might be a psychologist or carer.

In contrast, people who like more intense forms of music, like the following tracks, tend to be ‘systematisers':

Concerto in C — Antonio Vivaldi
Etude Opus 65 No 3 — Alexander Scriabin
God save the Queen — The Sex Pistols
Enter the Sandman — Metallica

Systematisers like to look for rules and patterns in the world and have less interest in the emotions.

Typical occupations for systematisers might be engineer or mathematician.

If you like tracks from both the lists, then your personality likely has a balance of empathising and systematising components.

Mr David Greenberg, who led the study, said:

“Although people’s music choices fluctuates over time, we’ve discovered a person’s empathy levels and thinking style predicts what kind of music they like.

In fact, their cognitive style — whether they’re strong on empathy or strong on systems — can be a better predictor of what music they like than their personality.”

The results come from a survey of over 4,000 people.

Empathisers tended to prefer more mellow and unpretentious music, psychologists found.

Systematisers, though, generally preferred more intense forms of music.

Dr Jason Rentfrow, one of the study’s authors, said:

“This line of research highlights how music is a mirror of the self. Music is an expression of who we are emotionally, socially, and cognitively.”

Professor Simon Baron-Cohen, another of the study’s authors and expert on autism, said:

“This new study is a fascinating extension to the ’empathizing-systemizing’ theory of psychological individual differences.

The research may help us understand those at the extremes, such as people with autism, who are strong systemizers.”

The study was published in the journal PLOS ONE (Greenberg et al., 2015).
- See more at: http://www.spring.org.uk/2015/08/what-your-musical-taste-says-about-how-you-think.php#sthash.HzkfY8on.dpuf
 
A link to the PDF paper is at the end of the corresponding SOTT article here: http://www.sott.net/article/299322-Musical-preferences-linked-to-cognitive-processes
 
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