When I was in the sixth grade or so, I had a teacher who explained the difference between active and passive listening. I didn’t quite get it until a homework assignment got me up to speed.
Like most kids, I didn’t really care for doing homework. And so like many youngsters, I decided the best way to do homework was to listen to music while I studied.
I put on the album Rubber Soul, The Beatles 1965 album. I tried, but it was hard for me to concentrate on my homework! Not with all that great music going on. During the song “You Won’t See Me” I truly learned what was meant by active listening.
It wasn’t Paul McCartney’s lead vocal that was drawing me in. Instead, it was the background vocal harmonies. This was before I knew much about music theory, but I recognized the dissonance of the major second being sung in harmony, and the stepwise motion to resolving the dissonance. As you can see from the example attached, the voices lead naturally to the harmony of the piece.
I remember losing myself in the piece so much, of not paying much attention to the words, but only to listening to the harmony and its resolution.
Active listening indeed! Homework had no chance.
I absolutely agree about “You Won’t See Me”: The harmony backing vocals are what makes that song. Whenever it comes up, I find myself singing along to one, or both, of the harmony parts — not to the lead vocal (it’s too high for me anyway).
A quick anecdote about active vs. passive listening: Several years ago, before I switched back to pursuing a full-time music career, I had a gig as a marketing consultant for a small software development firm in Park Slope. It was a great, laid-back environment: all the programmers & developers were encouraged to get comfy and happy at their desks — which included plugging in their headphones and listening to their favorite music as they worked — all day, every day.
The owner of the firm — my client — noticed that I was the only one not listening to music. This surprised him, knowing that I was also the only musician, as he supposed that I would be the most eager one to plug in of the entire office. At length, he brought it up to me directly, expressing his confusion about my apparent lack of interest, and encouraging me to take advantage of the opportunity to get into the groove of my choice.
I had to explain to him that, as a musician, my mind is trained to listen to music in an analytical way. Consequently, I find it difficult to listen to ANYTHING passively — and for music that I especially like, it’s just about impossible. Because it’s impossible to devote full attention to two things at once, if I were to plug in the headphones and listen to music all day, I would never get any work done!