How do YOU listen to music?

[Sorrano]

I wonder if this could have anything to do with the basis of scales for the East and the West. Certain kinds of harmonies are easier on the ears.

[Peter]

I wonder if this could have anything to do with the basis of scales for the East and the West. Certain kinds of harmonies are easier on the ears.

But that is just from our own pre-conditioned and shifting western view point - remember in the middle ages, the major 3rd interval was regarded as dissonant.

[Bonn1827]

I'm going to answer my own question:

I listen to music through headphones whilst I'm at the gym, pounding the treadmill, torturing my limbs on the exercise bike, lifting horrific weights and engaged in similar Guantanemo Bay-type regimes involving unrelenting torture.

I've had to cancel out the wall of noise in the gym with whatever I can find which will compete. To this extent, then, music has become an activity simply meant to keep me sane!!

[Peter]

One favourite way for me is to listen lying down in the dark with no distractions whatsoever - another is to follow the score. I put the radio on when cooking and eating breakfast and I do like a cd in the car! So basically I have more than one way but the most rewarding has to be the first.

[Roehre]

One favourite way for me is to listen lying down in the dark with no distractions whatsoever - another is to follow the score.

That makes two of us

[Megan]

That makes two of us

Me too , I like a quiet atmosphere whilst listening to music.
For instance, this morning, I had the house to myself, I was listening to Barber's violin concerto, followed and savoured every moment. It was beautiful.

[atserriotserri]

One favourite way for me is to listen lying down in the dark with no distractions whatsoever - another is to follow the score. I put the radio on when cooking and eating breakfast and I do like a cd in the car! So basically I have more than one way but the most rewarding has to be the first.

Bravo! I prefer lying down in the dark but unfortunately the more frequent are when cooking or my equivalent of a cd in the car (ipod / train). I also play music at work, but it has to be music I'm familiar with, otherwise I end up listening instead of working.

I also like, when I have time, to try to play different recordings of a particular piece or movement, if possible with the score. This summer I was alone at home for the most of one day and spent it listening to the "Szene am Bach" movement of the Pastorale... in the evening, my mother-in-law didn't understood that my activity for almost one day of my holidays had been listening to the same "song" over and over, but that was PEACE!

[Michael]

I also like, when I have time, to try to play different recordings of a particular piece or movement, if possible with the score. This summer I was alone at home for the most of one day and spent it listening to the "Szene am Bach" movement of the Pastorale... in the evening, my mother-in-law didn't understood that my activity for almost one day of my holidays had been listening to the same "song" over and over, but that was PEACE!

I can well understand how you could spend a whole day listening to this movement.
Is there a more melodious or more beautifully orchestrated piece in this world?
I had the pleasure of walking by this brook in Heiligenstadt last March.

[Quijote]

Usually, I listen to music attentively, and have the unfortunate habit of visualising the notes (for a known piece), and more or less visualising the notes for an unknown piece (for notated music). Beyond the narrow parametres of notated (and perceived) pitch (but one parametre of the sonic universe), I tend to listen out for "gesture", "morphology", "texture" and "colour" (timbre). This is perhaps one reason why I am a fan of electroacoustic music (and I am not speaking about musique concrète per se). I hope this is as simple a résumée as is possible for such a wide question.

[gprengel]

I had the pleasure of walking by this brook in Heiligenstadt last March.

Which brook was this, Michael? Was it the one of the right picture of these:

http://gerdprengel.de/vienna.html ?

By the way, my favourite way to listen to Music is walking in a forest with my MP3 player. It is just sooo intense! Especially with Beethoven and Mendelssohn ...
Another way is, as already mentioned, with the score in my hands. It gives you an idea of so many details which otherwise I may overhear easily.

Gerd

[Roehre]

Which brook was this, Michael? Was it the one of the right picture of these:

http://gerdprengel.de/vienna.html ?

Gerd

Great pictures, Gerd !

[Quijote]

Is there a more melodious or more beautifully orchestrated piece in this world?

See above for the context. I am not a fan of rhetorical questions (for me, they are often demagogic), so I feel obliged to answer : yes.