Aaron Copland was a composer during the turn of the century. He was highly respected and a world-known composer. Copland was known as the very first genuine American Composer. Before his death in 1990, Copland composed a series of lectures about what to listen for in music. These lectures have been studied, applied and made into a book titled What To listen For In Music.
In chapter one, Preliminaries, Copland defines what it means to be musical. Being musical does not mean that you play an instrument or that you can even read music. It simply means that you can recognize a tune. According to Copland, recognizing a tune shows that you as a listener know where you are in music. If you know where you are then it is likely you know where
Chapter two of Copland’s novel tells how we listen. Copland breaks up the listening process into three components: the sensuous plane, the expressive plane, and the sheerly musical plane. The sensuous plain is the simplest way to listen to music. It exist when music is listened to for pleasure of the musical sound. The second plane on the existence of music is the expressive plane. Copland believes that all music has a certain meaning behind the notes. He also believes the notes constitute what the piece is saying and what the piece is about. I strongly agree with Copland on this thought. It is hard to imagine why a composer would construct a piece built on nothing. All pieces have a message to be sent and interpreted. That is why music is so in
Example Essays Home
