ACTIVE LISTENING

 

Introduction

There is a huge difference between hearing and listening, set apart the further concept of active listening.

Hearing is a passive behavior, the mere reception of acoustic stimuli followed by a certain level – very variable indeed – of cognitive elaboration.

Listening is a completely different thing: first of all is an active behavior, made of intention and attention, driven by clear objectives, aiming to understand something and to utilize this knowledge to improve and grow.

Active listening, on the other hand, is a further step, more articulate and fruitful, in our never-ending journey to become better musicians and improvisers; but what are the elements that differentiates active listening form mere listening of a piece of music?

First of all, active listening starts with the set up of clear and specific learning objectives: what do I want to learn? Articulation? Overall solo architecture? Use of particular improvisational devices? Other artistic matters? This step is very important, as it would be very easy – when listening to a beautiful jazz recording – to forget what we are looking for and to start to be driven away by emotions and feelings.

Another very important component of a true active listening is the understanding of some basic background elements:

• The historical period, with its political, economic, social and artistic specificity
• The current jazz scene, the sub genres and the key theoretical discussion topics
• The individual musician story – human and musical – his evolution, his main expressive and artistic goals

Last, but not least, it is very important to follow up after the listening session: have we learnt what we were looking for? What is still unclear? Any idea for further in-depth analysis?

Active listening strategy

Lets’ draft now a simple template to achieve consistency in our active listening project.

1. Write down some overall objectives: for example, to understand Sonny Rollins articulation, to be able to learn how the bebop fathers really use enclosures, to become proficient in perceiving different ways and depth of swinging, to understand how Clifford Brown builds the overall architecture of his solos…anything could do.
2. Make a list of records and specific pieces to listen to
3. Find a quiet place, find an appropriate time slot when nobody will disturb you, switch your smartphone in silent mode, dim the lights, sit down in your favorite armchair with a note pad and a well sharpened pencil
4. Make sure you can easily stop-rewind-forward your playback tool. It could seem obvious and stupid, but there is nothing like little menial issues that can be able to disrupt your concentration flow.
5. Have your “task list” at hand
6. Make a first uninterrupted listening session of the piece, be attentive but relaxed
7. Think about what you have learnt and what didn’t go in the right way
8. Restart to listen in a more articulate way; do not hesitate to stop, rewind or restart the piece if you feel that you are losing concentration and grip
9. Take notes on your note pad
10. If you perceive that you cannot listen actively anymore, just stop and take a break
11. At the end of your session write down a summery on your diary: what have you listened at? What the background? What were your objectives? What have you learnt? What is still unclear? Next steps?

A last consideration: being able to setup a working active listening strategy and habit is a very useful step to develop good transcription skills.

But this is another story for another post...