4 Contributory Factors-Music Appreciation

Book:Teaching Musical Appreciation,Terence Dwyer, pp.188

1)Sensuous Pleasure
Likes and dislikes....(dislikes may arise from some physical reason connected with the hearing process.)
Normal music lover-pleasure from single notes,simple chord,chordal progression, complete musical style

2)Kinaesthetic Pleasure
Physical response to the rhythm of the music.'Whatever operation we allow our bodies to perform in response to the sounds of music, it will be rhythmically regular:it will conform to a regular pulse. (HAHAH!!-SO ME)
Notice that the complexities of modern rhythm confuse the listener and inhibit his motor response (no wonder, I don't really favour pop/modern music,ie.Bjork)
Classical music,in which the beats are often IMPLIED and have to be supplied by the listener,who may well give up the struggle and declare that the music has no beat(no wonder,most ppl don't connect with classical music)
The importance of the kinaesthetic response to music must on no account be underrated. Without it a large part of music would be meaningless. It has an importance reaching far beyond its obvious manifestations.
(that is why i emphasize on CLAPPING AND GETTING THE BEAT!!)

3)Intellectual Pleasure
The ability of the listener to perceive,remember, recognise and compare obviously depend all the principles of musical form.The point of a recapitulation is lost unless it is recognised. The point of a variation is lost unless the listener knows that it is the same as the original and that it is in some way differnt. Textural devices such as canon, imitation, and fugue depend entirely on recognition and comparison. So do inversion and augmentation. At every turn the co-operation of the mind is invited. More subtle refinements appear, such as the creation of an expectation and a thwarting of its fulfilment, ambiguities, allusions to other styles, and quotations from other works. Any kind of musical analysis involves the listener in intellectual activity-he (she?) looks at the various parts and attempts to discover the nature of their relatinoships with each other. There can be little doubt that the intellectual side of listening to music is both important and neglected or misunderstood.

This is the aspect of listening which most needs TEACHING,and yet teaching of it is often resisted violently by some people. They protest that analysis is cold and that it will destroy beauty. One finds this attitude in both children and adults. I have certainly run across my share of doubters, whose plausible moan 'but this sort of thing takes all the pleasure out of music' is not easy to refute with an epigrammatic reply. One knows that such people are wrong (in fact,are probably mentally lazy), and that intellectual effort, whilst it may cause us to lose sight of beauty temporarily, does in the end increase one's pleasure. One knows that composers did not put various devices and relatinoships into thier music in order that they might go unnoticed. But it is difficult to convince these people on the spot.One has to ask them to give our system a trial and trust the music not to wither away (it is, in fact, a test of good music that it stands up to analysis). Certainly many of the wonders to be found in compositions of genius lie on the intellectual side. And however well equipped a composer may be to express himself emotionally, he is not thought highly of unless he can order his work intellectually.

Now, what is the nature of the listener's intellectual response? Chiefly it consists of understanding.There is a pleasure in understanding things. It is a difficult pleasure to explain, but it is almost universally felt. It is the joy of mastering a difficulty, and it has its roots in the instincts of curiosity and acquisitiveness. It may even vicariously supply a feeling of creativeness. It includes admiration for the real creator of whatever is understood, especially where this is a work of art.

I nod my head from start to end of this paragraph

4)Aesthetic Pleasure
Response to the perception of beauty.The task of the teacher of Musical Appreciation includes,the holding up of good examples in the hope that others may catch, as it were, the infection of their beauty;but there is no way to teach what beauty is.We have to lead horses to water and hope that they will drink.

His standing: The aesthetic experience is biggest contribution, followed by the intellectual.
OKAY: ENUF TYPING. I FOUND WHAT I WANTED TO KNOW. :)