Musicosophia, the art of creative listening

Musicosophia
The Art of Creative Listening
"The way we consider great classical music is usually quite superficial. We treat it as entertainment whereas it is really an appeal for introspection, self-knowledge and the search for the meaning of life."
Based on this firm conviction George Balan, a Romanian musicologist and philosopher, founded a school that teaches "the art of consciously listening to music". Located in the remote village of Sankt Peter, in the High Black Forest near Freiburg, Germany, and founded in 1979, it is the first school of its kind in the world. Before coming to Freiburg, Balan taught for more than 20 years as Professor of Musical Aesthetics at the conservatoire in Bucharest and was famous as a radio-presenter in Romania. Supported by five staff he now devotes himself to this, his life's work  musicosophia, which teaches how consciously to unlock the hidden wisdom of the music of the great European masters.
After years of searching and deep personal experiences Balan came to a surprising and, of its kind, unique conclusion: in order really to understand the music of Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Brahms, Schubert and other masters, one does not need to be a learned specialist but a conscious listener.
Since 1992 the school has been offering, in Sankt Peter, Rome and Madrid, three-year courses in "conscious listening"; these are open to anyone, even with no previous musical knowledge, who wants to acquire a completely new understanding of music and of themselves, maybe even to arrive at a musical art of living. Some students seek a thorough training in European classical music; others, who already work with music, come for further musical education; and some are thinking of training to teach musical listening themselves  the motives are endless. Whichever goal the friend of music may wish to achieve, as a listener he is being asked to contribute his part to the final stage of musical creation: through his achievement of a spiritualized listening he is rounding off the process of creation of both the composer and the interpreter.
Understanding Music
What does consciously to listen to music mean? This skill seems not to come naturally, otherwise the existence of such a school would be unnecessary. Music is a language, and as such has an interpretative role.
The message contained in music needs to be understood. Just as with a text of literature one needs firstly to understand the structure of the text and the meaning of the words before a deeper understanding is possible. It therefore requires an intellectual effort, a methodical approach and an examination through logical thinking. "In order really to understand music," says Balan, "you have to learn to detach from the musical euphoria and emotional surges, because otherwise all you will be aware of is yourself, and you will not understand what objectively the music represents." People want to be able to do more than just be swept along by the emotion of the music; they want to be able to see behind the text and, one could say, meet the spirit of the music through their ears. To understand the deepest levels of the music they would need to listen repeatedly to one piece, to re-experience it within themselves and to reflect upon it  and also to make the musical structures visual through the drawing of graphics.
To Think Musically
Uwe Fricke, Director of the school, who has long been working with Balan, explained the process of understanding which the listener has to undergo: "The understanding of music does not mean simply to sit down, close your eyes and ponder about the philosophical message of one or other piece. The real understanding which we aim to achieve in the students in our seminars is a comprehensive process that although involving the mind goes beyond it, because that is where the most valuable experiences happen. We try to teach a holistic musical understanding, where you think about music and think music, so that you may reach the threshold where you leave the thinking behind. Reaching that point is a very liberating experience because it enables human dignity to blossom.
The purpose of repeated listening is to comprehend the musical thinking of the composer  the first theme, the second, a reprise, the melody, the finale, and so on until the complete architecture has been uncovered. Says Fricke: "The creative part of listening begins afterwards. Now try to imagine how the theme of the piece you have been listening to could be translated into movement. It is enough to sound the music under your breath, to whistle it, a few times with great concentration and to watch what happens with your arms and hands." The melody you hear can be drawn with your hands. The listener then re-composes the music, and this is where the holistic effect of it begins, because you are approaching its objective dimension. This is where what is important is not "I"  my idea, my fantasy  but what Mozart, Beethoven or Schubert themselves have created within their music.
Musical Meditation
Once the listener has reached a state of intense contemplation with music of the great masters like Bach, Mozart, Brahms, Beethoven, Schubert, Bruckner, Mahler or Wagner, he will find the opening to an inner well, to deep, spiritual revelation. In his book ABC des schφpferischen Musikhφrens (The ABC of listening creatively to Music), Balan explains: "Love of music and knowledge of music form the forecourt to the temple we enter to converse with God. By leading us to our true identity music opens the way to God, because there is no difference between having found true faith and our own, true Self. This is the reason for the mysterious answer to the Moses question: 'I am that I am' ..., and we experience music in just the same way with our aspiration because music is 'I am' made into sound, a ray of the Divine." Therefore, the idea of consciously listening to music comes out of a deep desire of the human soul, out of a longing and out of the urge for contemplation and meditation. Seen in that way Balan once described music as a "melodious human discipline" that contains everything the soul needs to know to achieve liberation and that also bestows the necessary strength.
Seen as a path of spiritual discipline by the earnest listener, in certain moments of focused listening combined with contemplation, music opens the ear to something fundamental that goes beyond the personality.
Music has always accompanied Balan throughout the difficulties and challenges of his life. It gradually became his spiritual teacher, revealing what stayed hidden in the sciences based on words. Balan's desire to explore the interaction between music and spirituality stems from his particular set of life circumstances whose roots lie in his childhood. "By the age of 13 or 14 I had become a complete autodidact. More and more I realized that my attitude to music was different from that of others. By the time I was 20 and studying music at the conservatoire I had a reputation of being a difficult case because I had expectations of music that were there left unfulfilled."
This process came to a head when on completion of his musical studies in his late 20s he suddenly realized that music is revelation  a particular kind of philosophy. "That was in Moscow, and that is also where the foundations of musicosophia were laid with my dissertation άber den philosophischen Gehalt der Musik (The Philosophical Aspects of Music). Many a colleague did not take me seriously then because they thought I was looking for something in music that simply did not exist."
On his return to his native country Balan had to encounter much criticism and oppression because of his unusual attitude to music and his progressive ways of thinking. He was persecuted to the point where living and working in Romania was becoming impossible, and in 1977 he fled to Germany where he could finally begin to establish his ideas.
On a visit to Sankt Peter Share International interviewed him
Share International: Does the intensity that springs from the experience of conscious listening depend on the level of awareness of the listener? On his mentality, his development and last but not least on his ability to be receptive?
George Balan: You could say that. Sound depends on a completely different culture, a culture that most of us have not learnt to handle. A particular kind of awareness is necessary in relation to music. How one handles sound, one's ability to be open to sound and its spiritual gifts  all of this cannot be taken for granted. Many philosophers are more or less deaf to music. They are able to solve all the problems in the world but they cannot pick out the lead theme of a piece of music. They are sensitive to intellectual ideas but not to musical ideas. All of us are almost like children when it comes to understanding music.
SI: How far is it possible to deepen this state of awareness through repeated listening?
GB: There is practically no end to this process.
SI: So you could say that there exists a definite movement, a living and continuing development?
GB: Yes. With every effort you make, each time you earnestly try, you don't just get a sense but become convinced that you have gone deeper. Music is unlimited. You stop trying to get deeper into a piece and after months or even years you discover this music anew.
SI: Novalis, German Romantic poet and novelist, is reputed to have said that illness is a musical problem and that through certain sounds man can be brought back into harmony with himself, with the cosmos.
GB: Music can give us an enormous amount, spiritually speaking. But what we do with its contents depends entirely on ourselves. Otherwise, all composers and interpreters would be the healthiest people in the world, but that is of course not so.
SI: But it would be possible to cure a person's wounded soul?
GB: Everything is possible but not with the current methods used in music therapy. Something happens to that person's spirit, and nobody can diagnose what really is happening. From this centre where the music penetrates something can arise that has the potential to heal. In my opinion it is wrong to say, however, that a certain illness requires a certain music for healing. Sound can create and structure; sound can repair our spirit. And it is our spirit that continues to have an effect and that sees to things. But if I suffer from an illness like rheumatism, or a skin disease, or cancer, what could Mozart possibly compose for my rheumatism? He can fill me spiritually with a certain power and then it will be up to me to do something with that power. It is not the music itself that heals an illness. Jesus himself said: "It is not I who has healed you, it is your faith." That person had such strong faith that it healed him.
SI: So in a sense the music is the source of inspiration, communicating to us something higher, connecting us with our spiritual self which can then itself take effect?
GB: First and foremost, a true love of music is needed. Because in reality it is the love that heals. Love is the highest power. The golden principle is that music will help us when we do not expect or demand or force her help  just as in a relationship between two people. Music cannot cope with being used. The nature of music, "Frau Musica", cannot cope and does not reply. True love knows no purpose. And so we listen to music not in order to get something from it, but because of the music itself, because of the joy that being with music brings. Self-knowledge comes like an additional gift. Self-knowledge takes a lifetime. You become more and more aware, and music helps in this process .SI: ... and has an essential human dimension.

Copy c by Trouble

www.aca.gr

 

The notion that the observer of a work of art plays a fundamental part in the artistic process - the 'death of the author' - is hardly a new one, given that that's basically the foundation of aesthetic postmodernism.

I'd certainly agree that real familiarity with a single piece of music - which is more easily and completely attained by playing it than by 'active listening', or indeed by analysis of the score - can often lead to a peculiarly intimate relationship with that musical work, a much more complete appreciation of it than is achieved otherwise. If you're trying to learn to 'think about music and think music' though, it seems contradictory to try to 'make the musical structures visual through the drawing of graphics' - surely the argument for this "active listening" thing is the exploration of music as a medium uniquely suited to the communication of emotional and philosophical ideas which cannot readily be expressed in any other way.

This Balan chap seems to be trying to give the impression that he's the first person ever to take a considered philosophical approach to music, when actually that's basically what musicologists do - see your local friendly university for a whole department's worth.

 

Another attempt to Intellectualise music by critical analysis when will it end

 

I have not read all of it, I'm very tired right now, but I don't think I agree with "you have to learn to detach from the musical euphoria and emotional surges, because otherwise all you will be aware of is yourself, and you will not understand what objectively the music represents"

I believe the point of music is to communicate an emotional experience, so, you are not feeling yourself but rather the artist when you listen to music and because we all have emotions we can all understand the message. To detach yourself from this is to completely miss the point of music.

I can understand that to 'know' exactly what?s going on in the music it could help.. as in knowing what musical devices are used, syncopation, harmony, timbre etc.. but to 'understand' the music you MUST experience the emotional surges as that?s what it?s all about!

In my experience, knowing the theory and method of production behind music actually makes it more difficult to understand the message as it causes a distraction when listening. I find myself thinking about how it was written and made and then do not fully experience the piece.

I have always been one to think people who like music for its intellectual stimulation and cleverness are completely missing the point though. Don't get me wrong, music that makes you think is all good, but liking music just because it?s clever, is pointless IMO. If it doesn?t sound good and aid the communication then its silly.

Well that?s my little rant anyway! What do others feel, does knowing how music is made help you ?understand? what the artist was ?getting at? or does it causes more of a distraction from the intended message?

 

Just to clarify: I'm not in musicology myself, but what the musicologists do is eminently worthwhile and indeed vital to keep the artform alive - without innovation we basically cannot have art, and without critical understanding innovation is next to impossible.

OTOH this Balan guy appears to be just a bit bonkers.

You could argue that musical composition is essentially a process of trying to capture moods, emotions etc. and convert them into sounds which induce the same moods or emotions in the listener. How the listener perceives the music is necessarily specific to each individual; everyone is different, therefore everyone's aesthetic and emotional response to a given work of art is different.

An appreciation of how the music works technically may, depending on the music and the listener, improve to a greater or lesser extent the listener's receptiveness to and capacity to understand the music's message. One's understanding of any music depends to an extent on prior experiences - listening to music from a completely different culture is often bewildering because the ear has no frame of reference. In the classical field a composer is of course usually very highly musically literate and the music is written accordingly - when the composer writes music which captures a particular emotion for himself or herself, that means it captures a particular emotion for someone who is very musically literate. The casual listener, therefore, may find that some degree of understanding of the musical processes helps achieve an appreciation of what the music is trying to say.

 

i think it is a very

interesting piece.
i think the key to understanding the post is to re-read the piece but don't automatically asume you know what it is about.
you have made judgements about the piece with disregard for the meaning of the article.
you have automatically dismissed parts by failing to appreciate or understand the topic.
please go over the article again but think about it rather than posting up a comment.
i am not saying you guys don't like or understand music but you really need to look at the article again and then read into your own comments.
you have forum-itis.

 

It strikes me that the man is missing the point. undoubtably with some music it is possible to appreciate the architecture, the great Schubert G major quartet springs to mind, where he is in two keys at once, and the Major/Minor tonality would be hard to appreciate, the question remains is is that the only point of that piece of music, or was it written to give pleasure and fulfill a need to stimulate intellectually the composer. Music without emotion is pointless, most composers wrote their music to stir an emotion of some description, be it Bach or Wagner. So if you can appreciate it emotionally the composer has achieved his intent. If you can understand how the composer has achieved the result you have obviously had some sort of training.
Art is a difficult concept, but it can be appreciated on many levels. This chap in Italy seems to be claiming guru-ship to me. I bet he makes a lot of money out of it.

 

darrylfunk, I find rather offensive your suggestion that I failed to understand the article. As I indicated in my earlier post, the subject of the article appears to be trying to portray himself as a radical free thinker despite not actually being aware of mainstream thought; as I also indicated some of his ideas seem ill-thought-out and self-contradictory. Like lordsummit, I feel he is trying to put himself across as some kind of guru figure through the use of semi-meaningless quasi-mystical language.

If you disagree with anything I wrote, I'd be grateful if you'd take your own advice and read it, then explain specifically why you think it's wrong - perhaps then we can have a meaningful discussion about it.

 

The gent seems to ignore the fact that great music is a work of art, an individual expression of a composer, and the reactions of other individuals to it will be different. It's like people looking at a great painting, some will dissect how the painter achieved his effects by use of brush strokes, etc. Others will be happy just to drink in the whole thing, enjoying it without being conscious of how it has been done. Take Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring"; Stravinsky made the cello part at the start very difficult, so that the players would be tense and that tension would come over in the playing and add to the atmosphere. Some appreciate that, others don't, but recognise the effect that Stravinsky tried to achieve.

I guess what I am saying is that, while I appreciate any effort to encourage people to listen to great music and to enhance their enjoyment of it, I feel uncomfortable with any "one size fits all" formulation. We all come to music in different ways, and while such ideas as expressed by Trouble might be useful for some folk, they cannot and should not overwhelm the individual reaction. I am also bothered by the religious overtones. While music can indeed have a spiritual dimension, as it has for me, especially with Bach and his devout Christianity, there are equally devout atheists who also love the works of Bach. They take something different away from it. And that's how it should be. We should all drink at the well of great music, but not necessarily all in the same way.

 

yep your right

i'm wrong silly me.
ok.
no worries .....
cheers.
enjoy.
peace.
usual mind boggling ansewers from non - thinkers.
two ears one mouth .
unfortunately no one heeds my comments.
fair enuff.
i'ts as bad as pink fish.
goodnight.
p.s. please read my comments.
no were does the guy say he wants to be a guru or anything else.
you are imposing your own views on an incomplete article and coming out with an odd "my world" individualistic view of what was written.
please learn to absorb something without the need to reply.
you may come across as a more considered person then.
i am not making a personal attack you are as bad as some of the pink fish muppets.

 

lol

 

has his prescription run out?

 

If you think my original post betrayed a lack of understanding of the article or 'non-thinking' I'd be interested to know how.

What comments? You haven't said anything except that we haven't understood the article in some unspecified fashion.

Come on, now you're just being silly

It's called 'having an opinion'.

It's called a 'discussion forum'.

Engage in discussion pertaining to the matter at hand and you may come across as a 'more considered person'. Cast vague, undefined aspersions about the intellectual capacity of members of this forum and tell us what we are and are not allowed to talk about and you won't.

 

well

you slagged the bloke off not me !
i just suggested there was more to it than you so bluntly dismissed.
who is "we" ?
i take it you meant yourself.
your views are valid and i respect them . i just suggest in respect to the original post you read my suggestions of taking more care about reading and not in between the lines if you no what i mean.
i'll try to keep it simple.
your coming across as one of those people who criticise everthing about there own town for instance but fail to intergrate or be positive about anything that they don't agree with or understand.
tolerance and listening can lead to knowledge , used intelligently and with experience you end up with wisdom.
cheers.

 

chill out folks, its an interesting article - it doesnt need to get personal.

 

Errr......... Unfortunately, after much careful :rds2: chin rubbing, in my humble opinion this is the kind of elitism that put a lot of people off classical music.

By the way, have you ever wonder why are people so argumentative when it comes to this hobby? I am probably guilty as charge but, what is it that makes almost every other innocent discussions end up in flames.

 

I dunno this is worse than any other, pc forums can be awful, car forums etc.

 

Personally I find the subject of the reception, appreciation and understanding of art absolutely fascinating, and while I'm not convinced this Balan chap offers any special insights I thought the original post in this thread might constitute a useful way to get a relevant discussion off the ground. To get the ball rolling I offered a criticism of what I see as some of the problems with his point of view; this does not in my book constitute 'slagging the bloke off'. For some odd reason you seem to have taken as a personal insult the suggestion that it might be possible not to take Balan's word as gospel, without actually offering any counter-argument to the points I raised.

Well I'm all ears. Let's hear it, and maybe we can all learn something.

Well, when you said in your first post 'i am not saying you guys don't like or understand music but you really need to look at the article again', it seemed not unreasonable from the context to assume that you were referring to some or all of the people who had posted in the thread before you. That would include me, hence my use of the word 'we'.

I tried my best to read and understand the original post, and to be honest I thought I wasn't doing too badly. Again, if you think I missed or misunderstood anything, I'd be grateful if you could enlighten me. And to be honest I'm not quite sure I do know what you mean by 'reading and not in between the lines'.

Look, I have absolutely no quarrel with you, or for that matter anyone else on this forum. I just can't understand why you seem to be trying to bring about a blanket ban of discussion of this issue, without actually giving any criticism of the points raised.

bottleneck, looking back my previous post does look a bit terse, but rest assured I'm reasonably chilled out.

 

I'm going to stun people here, I'm in agreement with Woofie on this one, it'll only ever happen once though
If the music connects with you cool, I'm all for that if you get your rocks off on it hey who am I to knock it, but this intellectual wanna be player is well??? just after a self affirmation adrenalin shot in the cerebellum, front parietal Lobe area, whooo.... my higher reasoning needs another 5 IQ points this week. else I can't keep up with chums with the Genius edition of Trivial pursuit.
Maybe he needs to spend another £40K on his system to help him realise this maybe?. Or perhaps I missing the point implicitly, These earth shattering events keep me riveted to this planet with such gusto and zeal I hardly ever get time for the basic mundane duties in life, like keeping the equilibrium of this universe stable, such a task pales into insignificance to the deep undertones of musical dissection in the link above. please forgive me Lord for I have sinned
And on the eight day, we all sold our souls for rock and roll.

 

To drag the thread vaguely back on topic (and yes, I know it's mainly my fault )...

I agree absolutely. Unlike yourself I'm not a musician in any serious sense, but what I have learnt about music from a technical point of view has only deepened my appreciation and enjoyment of it (and given me a sense of amazement that anyone can actually write music ). As you say, art often works on many levels; my point of view has always been just that a degree of technical understanding will sometimes make available an extra level or two, without detracting any from the 'instinctive' response.

That's very interesting actually - must say I never thought about it like that. I suppose to be really good at orchestration you need to be able to understand the players as well as the instruments.

I think you've put your finger on what was bothering me tones - this guy's ideas, from the presentation here, don't seem to me especially novel or well thought out, and that makes me rather distrust his claim to have found the 'one true way'.

Maybe I should go off and start up a new forum, where people who want to have a slightly abstract discussion can do so without the naysayers coming along and saying it's all b****cks.