Non-musicians understand and feel music in a lot more detail and complexity than we realise...

jaymenon

When I was a child I had a record player with a selection of simple songs one of which was 'Goodbye Sam, Hello Samantha' (whilst not Steely Dan, that song has a reasonably complex melody and chord structure).  There were also a large number of children’s television serials with music that was fairly deep / complex musically - 'Sesame Street Blues' anyone?

The interesting thing is that while I have not heard any of those pieces of music for the past 40 years, if I pick up a guitar now I am able to play them quite faithfully to the original pieces of music including added notes, inversions etc.  This is based on a musical memory from the time when I was between the ages of five and eight, long before I ever learnt to play a musical instrument.

It therefore sort of follows logically that we perhaps understand and feel a lot of the music that we listen to, even down to its reasonably complex structure, even when we are at a stage in life when we do not understand the theoretical basis behind it, let alone know how to play it on a musical instrument.

Try it yourself - play a song from your childhood that you have not heard since, based purely on your memory from the last time you heard it as a child.  I’m sure you’ll be very surprised...

It certainly gratifying that when you play a piece of music to a 'non-musician' it’s quite likely that they do understand a lot more than we realise...

ICBM

I've always thought this is true - the problem for them is that without the technical language we use to describe things, it's often difficult for them to accurately put into words.

But I've never doubted than non-musicians can hear just as well as we can when things sound right and when they don't - including song structures, sounds, and mixes. It always annoys me when musicians are dismissive of a non-musician's opinion... the classic one for me is that when a member of the audience tells you something like "the guitar is too loud", *it is* - or possibly too strident or trebly for the mix so it sounds 'loud' - but that there is definitely something wrong. Non-musicians know what music sounds like when it's right, and if a musician thinks "what do they know? It sounds fine to me" then invariably it's not the non-musician who is wrong.

Funkfingers

I know what I like and I like what I know.

Musicwolf

ICBM said:

But I've never doubted than non-musicians can hear just as well as we can when things sound right and when they don't - including song structures, sounds, and mixes.

I couldn't agree more.  If the public at large can't appreciate 'good' from 'bad' when it comes to a mix then myself, and a lot of other people, have wasted a huge amount of time, effort and money chasing something that doesn't matter a jot (although it might not matter quite as much as we sometime imagine when we're trying to justify a new purchase).

Whether it's writing, performing or mixing there are three levels;

Is it right? (hopefully the majority of the population can tell)

What is it that isn't right?

What do I need to do to put it right?

It's in the second two steps that the training / practice / experience kicks in.

merlin

You were already a musician as a child.

jeztone2

My sister in law is like this. She really understands guitar tones. While her terminology is unusual. She’s got ears like a bat. As both my brothers and her son play as well. She’s been exposed to quite a lot of guitars over the years. 

viz

merlin said:

You were already a musician as a child.

I think that is very much a part of it

TINMAN82

merlin said:

You were already a musician as a child.

I tend to agree with this line of thinking. We all have capacity to learn and improve but music is definitely a field where we’re not all born equal.

Many people can remember and pick out a single note melody (eg pick up a harmonica for the first time and work out 3 blind mice). But if you’re recalling a tune from childhood in chords with inversions that’s a bit unusual.

thegummy

I think it's true that a lot of things in a record, or even just in a song, that we'd think were technical and subtle and maybe think Joe Bloggs wouldn't even hear do actually affect his enjoyment or emotional response to the music.

They wouldn't be able to explain it or even possibly know why it made it better for them, or even be consciously aware it exists, but on a primal level they experience it.

When I was a proper wee weane, maybe even pre-school, I liked some pretty weird music that I heard people playing and some of my very first favourite songs are now songs I appreciate as being musically brilliant.

Something I have found to the contrary, though, is that until I started playing bass (about 4 years ago), even though I had been a musician playing keyboard, writing songs, in to theory etc. for the best part of 20 years, I never heard or felt or "got" bass lines like I do now. And it's not just that I understand them academically or listen out for them more now, I can be listening to just the cheap wee radio in the kitchen and the bass sounds so loud and clear compared to when I listened to the same records before I took up bass. It's almost like my brain has been EQed.

danishbacon

As a child and teenager I would often find myself longing for variation in a melody that never came. Maybe and end note a few semitones lower, an unexpected but musically ‘correct’ variation. I also recall thinking how those changes would have been a missed opportunity to make the music more exciting, followed by a sense of disappointment. 

Get a child to dance to a song and they will often understand the rhythmic structure fairly quickly. How many people can whistle a song or hum it but be completely lost with any instrument or even their voice? 

p90fool

When I've nearly completed a song in my studio I have a couple of non-musician friends I run it by to see what they think. They're both mid-20s and keen and knowledgeable about music but have no technical knowledge about how it's made. 

Their input is always far more useful than any from my musician friends. 

mudslide73

It always intrigues me why more music lovers don't go the extra step and start playing. It seemed obvious to me that I should. 

I think there's some value in the idea of us all having the musical capability but some people don't use it.. so then it goes away.

gordiji

The hard part is expressing what you hear in your head through your fingers.

axisus

I'm not that sure I agree. I think that you are describing a talent that just some people have, like most talents. I have nothing of what you are talking about personally. Most non-musicians I have met in life have no clue about music other than they 'like' something.

Just my current uneducated opinion. happy to be proved wrong ....

JezWynd

merlin said:

You were already a musician as a child.

That's it. I'm the opposite - I would spend hours tuning a guitar in the pre tuner days - the subtly differences in timbre between strings would completely throw my tuning ear. What finally enabled me to learn was using a digital tuner. Once I learnt what the correct notes sound like and the separation between notes, I can now tune by ear but transposing a tune to guitar is still difficult.

Rocker

mudslide73 said:

It always intrigues me why more music lovers don't go the extra step and start playing. It seemed obvious to me that I should. 

I think there's some value in the idea of us all having the musical capability but some people don't use it.. so then it goes away.

Does not follow.  Just because a person can run to catch a bus, does not mean that they should run a Marathon.  Music affect people in different ways.  In some ways, not being able to play an instrument gives one the freedom to analyse the whole music.  Not just the instrument he plays.

thecolourbox

mudslide73 said:

It always intrigues me why more music lovers don't go the extra step and start playing. It seemed obvious to me that I should. 

I think there's some value in the idea of us all having the musical capability but some people don't use it.. so then it goes away.

It does depend what they like about music as well. For example I recall going to see The Horrors because I liked the music but most people were there to enjoy drinking and throwing beer whilst twatting about shoving each other as soon as the tempo suited. 

Also, I play classical and Jazz piano, though very rarely listen to jazz piano really. I enjoy listening to some synth atmospheric music, dunno what it's called but for ease maybe just "electronic" covers it - however I've absolutely no desire whatsoever to learn how to make that music myself and even less to have that identify my musical voice.

Tex Mexico

I think like a lot of things it really depends on the individual.

I do know I was more musically-inclined as a child, I remembered melodies and rhythms and could reproduce them vocally or physically without any "work" long before I picked up an instrument or started singing seriously. I remember there were kids who became musicians at a much younger age than I did and who had a much more obvious talent for it. However there were also a good number of tin-eared kids who it is my suspicion wouldn't have been able to realise any kind of musical ability no matter how much work they put into it.

I also don't think there's necessarily a correlation between natural musical talent and going on to seriously practice music. I know loads of adults who can sing beautifully and have a good sense of rhythm but "never got around" to taking it any further, and conversely I also know a good number of practicing musicians whose natural talent, shall we say, has yet to manifest. Those are the guys who show up whenever I'm auditioning for band members.

munckee

Tex Mexico said:

I think like a lot of things it really depends on the individual.

I do know I was more musically-inclined as a child, I remembered melodies and rhythms and could reproduce them vocally or physically without any "work" long before I picked up an instrument or started singing seriously. I remember there were kids who became musicians at a much younger age than I did and who had a much more obvious talent for it. However there were also a good number of tin-eared kids who it is my suspicion wouldn't have been able to realise any kind of musical ability no matter how much work they put into it.

I also don't think there's necessarily a correlation between natural musical talent and going on to seriously practice music. I know loads of adults who can sing beautifully and have a good sense of rhythm but "never got around" to taking it any further, and conversely I also know a good number of practicing musicians whose natural talent, shall we say, has yet to manifest. Those are the guys who show up whenever I'm auditioning for band members.

That's me!  One day I'll blossom...

roberty

jeztone2 said:

My sister in law is like this. She really understands guitar tones. While her terminology is unusual. She’s got ears like a bat. As both my brothers and her son play as well. She’s been exposed to quite a lot of guitars over the years. 

After 20 years of playing the guitar I can describe it very well but I can't hear a fucking thing

TheOtherDennis

Whilst I agree that generally people can tell when something is 'off' - witness them screw their faces up when someone hits a duff note - and can feel and hear more in music than they themselves appreciate, I agree far more with @axisus that they can't do what the OP can. I know I certainly can't, not even remotely, and I've been playing for quite a few years. I'd absolutely love to be able to do that, but I can't.

Like @Tex Mexico I struggled mightily to learn the guitar when I was younger, because I was utterly unable to tune it, for exactly the same reasons that he has. When I was a kid, my dad tried to teach me to tune the guitar using the piano, but I simply couldn't match the note from the keyboard with the note on the string.

While I would like more people to learn to play a musical instrument - apart from the obvious benefits of learning something for itself, there's a considerable amount of research that suggests music can help improve learning in many other subjects - I think that most people don't because they simply believe they can't. It's not true, but try changing their minds.

And whenever I've tried to create something new, just as @gordiji says is the problem for some people, I've failed utterly to get out of my fingers what's been in my head.