Sounds easy enough doesn't it? Slip the disk in the machine, hit play, sit
back, relax.........get dozy...............after 60 minutes, get bored....
The aim of this short article is to help the guitar-oriented CD listener
get more out of the music, basically by not asking of themselves and the
music more than is sensible. This follows up on Eliot Fisk's remarks in
the Fall 1996 issue of Guitar Review:
"Honestly I think sixty minutes is too long. However we have to do
it now because of the technology. People want their 'money's worth'. But
my mind stops working after about forty minutes of music, I have to confess.
There is something psychologically more right about that amount of time.
On the other hand, I love the idea of being able to structure music over
sixty or seventy minutes."
It doesn't really matter whether there is anything 'natural' in the forty
minute attention span, or whether it is an acquired preference after decades
of listening to LPs, given the technological constraints of the Long Playing
record format. I suspect it is a bit of both. However today's typical forty
minute each half recital programme dates from the hey-day of the LP; if
you look at programmes from the 48 era, (ie Segovia) they are usually broken
up into three shorter sections. Not as short as a 78 rpm record mind you,
but less than 40 minutes all the same.
Anyway, what I want to reinforce here is that for most music, it is too
easy with the CD format to listen too long. Broadly speaking, the less ambitious
the music in scope and intensity, the less likely it is to be suitable for
non-stop end-to-end listening. Thus a disc of Tárrega miniatures,
for example, or renaissance fantasias, really should not be heard in one
hour-long session. The composer never imagined that such music would be
consumed in such quantities in one go, and it is unfair on the music and
yourself (and the composer!) to try and take it in like that. On the other
hand a work conceived on the grand scale, (of which there are very very
few in the guitar's repertoire,) can and should be heard in one go.
Those are the extremes. Most guitar recordings fall somewhere in between.
So how do you decide how to listen to a recording? Well, identify how the
artist has laid out the programme. Are there natural breaks between composers
or between major works of the same composer? If so, add up one or two such
sections making 30+ minutes and treat that as 'one half' of a programme.
So you can listen to that, then hit Pause, run around the house twice, put
the kettle on, and stroke the cat; when refreshed, resume. Aim to make the
subsequent chunks shorter if possible than the first, as concentration is
likely to start to wane even with breaks. (And feel free to shuffle the
order of tracks; the artist will have planned the disk on the assumption
that it will be played from beginning to end; there's not much else they
can do. You however can do it differently.)
However its not quite as simple as that. Take into account in your calculation
of suitable programme breaks the 'weightiness' of the repertoire. Count
anything very modern, or Bach (suites/partitas etc) as lasting longer than,
say, Barrios. That's because these kinds of music take a lot more concentration
and so are likely to wear out your attention muscles faster, and require
more recuperation. This way you can learn that any tendency to find this
music 'too much' is largely a function of the amount of time your attention
is forced to function. One major advantage of any recording medium is the
resource to listen over and over perhaps just to a few bars. With any really
good music, familiarity breeds content, and appreciation. So if you often
find yourself put off by a modern work, or Bach (or indeed anything in principle),
try sampling it in small chunks repeated at least thrice. Then when the
details start to become familiar, hear it in large chunks and then whole.
The same applies particularly to very large works, even though at the outset
I said they should be heard complete. Ideally, yes they should, but if to
hear a large work end-to-end is to exhaust your ear this is not useful,
and unlikely to lead to long term appreciation and understanding.
As Fisk says, people want their money's worth. And quite right too! However
do not fall into the trap of thinking that because you can sit there for
80 minutes without moving a muscle, that this is a good idea. To summarise;
get to know the music which was created with the expectation of a more broken
up programming than that of the CD; this is virtually everything, and its
up to you to find the detail of how to hear your discs. Hear a sonata or
suite in one go, have a break; chop successions of short items into arbitrary
sessions of your choice. And weigh 'hard' music more than 'easy'.
Its a good way to learn to interact creatively and intelligently with the
repertoire you are learning your way around.