musical inability
I got asked to take a survey of academics about artistic affinities. Some of the questions were about art, but most had to do with music. They asked things like "Can you play a minute of an instrumental song (without words) in your mind?", or "Can you hear and identify individual instruments in an orchestral piece?", or "Can you accurately repeat a melody you've just heard?" My answers to all these questions were "Strongly no." Naming a song, say "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik" or "Für Elise", that I've heard many times before will not instantly put the tune in my head. If you start playing it, I can sing along, but my mind only goes a couple notes past the current note, then I need a cue again. The restriction to a wordless song is important, because if I have words, then they act as my cues for the memory (it's the opposite process of the oral tradition where you'd sing in order to remember the words of the story).
I didn't realize I lacked this ability, but it seems like such a basic musical ability to lack. Christian didn't believe me when I told him, just like a few years ago I told him that I can't count beats in a song. I can count with even timing, but it seems arbitrary to me how you map these measures to the song, quantizing it, and then count the beats within the measures. I'm not sure if I even said that correctly, because I misuse musical terminology such as rhythm, melody, harmony, pitch, etc. Not having played an instrument, I never learned any musical theory and so I only vaguely know what each of these terms is getting at. I hated the semester of music history we had in our high school because the teacher assumed we all knew what beats were, etc. Art history, on the other hand, was really neat. I cant't sing well either, though no one had the heart to tell me when I was younger. I found out when I watched a recording of my second or third grade school concert and could hear all the other students singing together while my own voice pierced out of harmony.
I like music and listen to it a lot. But I really think my aural abilities are limited and I've kind of given up on improving them.
I didn't realize I lacked this ability, but it seems like such a basic musical ability to lack. Christian didn't believe me when I told him, just like a few years ago I told him that I can't count beats in a song. I can count with even timing, but it seems arbitrary to me how you map these measures to the song, quantizing it, and then count the beats within the measures. I'm not sure if I even said that correctly, because I misuse musical terminology such as rhythm, melody, harmony, pitch, etc. Not having played an instrument, I never learned any musical theory and so I only vaguely know what each of these terms is getting at. I hated the semester of music history we had in our high school because the teacher assumed we all knew what beats were, etc. Art history, on the other hand, was really neat. I cant't sing well either, though no one had the heart to tell me when I was younger. I found out when I watched a recording of my second or third grade school concert and could hear all the other students singing together while my own voice pierced out of harmony.
I like music and listen to it a lot. But I really think my aural abilities are limited and I've kind of given up on improving them.