This is the first part of three sections of my second assignment for IDEA 2900: Sound, Music, and the Creative Self, as taught by Charmaine Liu at Kwantlen Polytechnic University. It is a written reflection on your participation in the course’s first listening exercises. Through it you have the opportunity to comment, with considerable latitude, on the full range of experience with these activities, including what you expected or assumed would happen before engaging with them, what you experienced during the activities, and how your initial impressions may have been changed or challenged after they were completed. This last step is particularly important because it asks you also to summarize your observations and learnings.
Exercise 1: WRITING DOWN ALL THE SOUNDS YOU HEAR
What I expect / assume will happen
It’s interesting that this is our first exercise, considering how this a course about sound, and Schafer opened the introduction of his book THE SOUNDSCAPE by quoting poet Walt Whitman’s 1855 poem, SONG OF MYSELF:
Now I will do nothing but
listen …
I hear all sounds running
together, combined, fused
or following,
Sounds of the city and
sounds out of the city,
sounds of the day and
night …
It’s as if Whitman penned today’s exercise 167 years ago. Whitman calls on us to slow down with his opening line, and in many ways it feels as though his first person narration could represent myself making this declaration to listen and this idea may have been what Schafer desired to see awakened in his reader’s minds. With his second line, Whitman also provides a commentary or how combined sounds feel like what marketing managers call ‘noise,’ which is the idea of how there can be ‘too much’ advertising raining down on people as they go about their day. It’s interesting that this idea was of concern to Whitman even 167 years ago, when it feels like he should have lived in a more simpler time. Finally, Whitman concludes with where we might encounter sounds, and when, in many ways suggesting that we are never really truly free from sound. For me, this idea that we are never away from sound, feels both sad and exciting.
In Chapter 14, Listening, Schafer also discusses the preparation of listening, which I found insightful. One point in particular stood out for me, and felt relevant to how I prepared for this, where:
“…we prepare for listening experiences with elaborate relaxation or concentration exercises. It may take an hour of preparation in order to be able to listen clairaudiently to the next.”
While it didn’t take me an hour, I definitely took time to sit for awhile. I thought about the exercise itself, I wondered about how I might feel in the moment. I’ve been anxious about my courses as well, especially since I’ve been so behind, so that too was in the back of my mind, gnawing away at my synapses.
Julia Cameron, in her book THE LISTENING PATH: THE CREATIVE ART OF ATTENTION lays out an exploration of sound and listening over a series of discussion, exercises and reflections that take place over a six eeek period. She opens the first week, which involves listening to our environment with a quote by Madeleine L’Engle, who notes how a
“Part of doing something is listening. We are listening. To the sun. To the stars. To the wind” (Cameron 37).
Listening never ceases, even for the death who learn how to listen with the range of their remaining senses, such as their eyes, nose, and fingers. There’s a gorgeously moving scene that demonstrates this idea in the 1994 theatrical biopic IMMORTAL BELOVED, where Ludwig Van Beethoven (Gary Oldman) listens to the music he plays by feeling it with his body:
The importance of listening was further emphasized by Kate Murphy, in her book YOU’RE NOT LISTENING: WHAT YOU’RE MISSING AND WHY IT MATTERS argues that listening is more valuable than speaking when she says how:
It is only by listening that we engage, understand, connect, empathize, and develop as human beings. It is fundamental to any successful relationship —personal, professional, and political (Murphy 1).
Overall, for me this exercise felt like it might be an easy exercise, but I can see how it might be difficult in terms of connecting with what it is I’m listening to, and describing it fully. In my revision for the first assignment, I kind of did this exercise already as when I re-wrote that piece, sitting at the kitchen table at my Mom’s house late at night. And I’m here again, in the same spot – it would be interesting if what I hear now will be similar to what I heard a few weeks ago.
What I hear
The most local sound I am hearing right now is the rhythm created by my fingers quickly dancing across my iPad’s keyboard. The timbre of the sound is composed of sharp clicks and taps, which range from a fast speed to a slower speed when I slow down my typing to think and listen to what I want to express next.
Another local sound that I hear is the hum of the large fridge that’s not far behind me. It’s not as close to me as my keyboard which I can touch with my fingers. I can lean back a bit and stretch my right arm towards the fridge and touch the side of the cabinet surrounding it. I don’t touch it long, it’s more of a thud that I take in as I almost swipe it with my fingers outstretched.
Just now, I hear the beer and wine fridge’s motor engage and even though it is further away, I notice how it makes a louder hum as it’s likely working harder to keep the contents of that below the counter fridge nice and cool. I notice that it has also drowned out the hum of the larger fridge that is closer to me.
Like I wrote in my revision of my first assignment, when I stop typing I can hear the muffled sound of the television in my Mother’s bedroom softly floating down the hall. It’s muted, so I can’t make out what is being said. It’s a woman’s voice, strong and confident. She’s possibly watching the news or a documentary, I’m not sure. When I type, the keyboard sound is loud enough that my mind focuses on the tap tap tap of the keys being struck, and I find I’m not aware of the television anymore as a result.
I take the time to pause and notice how I can hear the sound of my fingers running through my hair and stopping at a point on my neck to scratch an itch that’s been bothering me. This is maybe the most intimate sound so far, as it’s like I can feel and hear the sound of the scratch beneath my skin, as well as the slight ruffle sound of my fingers running through my hair.
I can hear the sound of air being sucked into my mouth as I begin to take a sip of water from a cup. I hear the water flowing into my mouth with a soft kind of swishing sound and a slight gulp, gulp, gulp as the suction along with my tongue helps to guide the water from the cup and down into my throat towards my stomach. I hear the sound of the cup as I put it back down on the table – I do it gently, so it’s not a loud noise, just a quiet plump.
What I experienced
The experience of just listening can be disconcerting, primarily if you’re sitting alone in relative silence. But it was also a little liberating to try to fully describe things that I heard, in concrete language that conveyed what I was hearing.
How my initial impressions may have been changed or challenged
Before doing this exercise again, I thought it would be easy, but it wasn’t. I felt unease and the desire to keep doing anything but listen intently A few times I found it helpful to actually slow my mind down by taking a few deep breaths and telling myself that it was okay to be present for this exercise. In hindsight, the sound of my breath was a seventh thing I heard while doing this exercise. Expanding on this, an eighth thing I heard while doing this exercise was the challenging sound of the voice in my head that could be referred to as my monkey mind, telling me how silly I was to sit there listening, and stupid to try and even work through my classes as I’ll only fail again. As I mentioned in my response to question “c,” in these moments I used my breath as a point of focus to remind myself that it was ok to allow these moments of listening to take place.