Maryse Abi Haidar, 201805087 E-Book Summary

Maryse Abi Haidar

201805087

E-Book Summary

Fall 2020

What Makes an Audience? Investigating the Roles and Experiences of Listeners

at a Chamber Music Festival

Pitts, Stephanie.

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 Maryse Abi Haidar, 201805087 E-Book Summary

In a Western concert hall, spectators and listeners are assumed to have a passive role in
which their only response could be through their attendance and applause. Several agreements
have been put in place to describe the silent and passive relation among the performers and
listeners1 which could be clearly seen through the architectural design of the concert halls leaving
the audience at a distance from the performers and musicians and so minimize their contact and
connection. The following study will assess how valid is the assumption of passive listeners
taking into consideration their experiences and roles in the concert halls.

Listening in the concert hall and beyond:

Attending a musical in a concert hall nowadays has become a rare event2. In fact, the
exhibition of old style music has been differently held to be in a condition of emergency, albeit
numerous journalists having reacted vigorously to such allegations, recommending that the
individuals who talk about an "emergency" in traditional music are truly depicting the
irreversible downfall of old, natural mentalities, desires and methods of working. Elite taste is
not characterized anymore as the communicated valuation for the high fine arts and a relating
moral scorn of all other stylish articulations. Despite the fact that Peterson's examinations of the
connection between melodic taste and word related status show a widening of perspectives and
admittance to old style music, the conventions of the concert hall oppose the contemporary life.
For some individuals, old style music appears to be a singular action, in its creation as well as
in its gathering. Crowds, in any event, show essentially no aggregate movement but the typical
applause.

Researching the audience experience:

This article studies the nature of concert listening and listeners’ experiences through an
empirical study held in May 2003 at the Crucible Studio Theatre in Sheffield for a weeklong

1
Christopher Small described listeners to be watchers with nothing important to do or contribute.
2
Several changes dominated the music industry nowadays, it is more affordable to hold a portable device that
enables you to listen to any song in any environment anywhere.

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 Maryse Abi Haidar, 201805087 E-Book Summary

where the program was based on the audience choice3. Through polls, interviews and
questionnaires, the audience reflected on their commitment with the concerts showing a high
level of commitment, mindfulness, and contribution that permitted them to feel connected with
the melodic occasion. Antoine Hennion recommends that this sort of subjective exploration into
musical behavior has gotten problematic as individuals are currently so "sociologized" that when
you ask them what their melodic tastes are, they will start by telling you all about their historical
family backgrounds4. For some respondents, such examination and reflection appeared to be a
recognizable piece of their concert-going conduct. The social impacts of the spectators upon each
other will also be analyzed, considering the different encounters of newcomers and more settled
audience members, some of whom had been attending since the establishment 20 years ago.

The effects of venues and spaces:

In the Crucible Studio, abnormally for a traditional music setting, members seemed to
feel part of the ‘communication loop’ depicted by Paul Berliner5 who states that similar to the
concert hall, the stage and the lighting outline the band's activity for the crowd's perception, it
additionally outlines the crowd's movement for the band to notice. Being 'in the round' implied
that the crowd had a reasonable view not just of the entertainers, yet in addition of others
occupied with tuning in. This was differently felt to be an interruption or a preferred position,
offering open doors for people-watching and finding companions. For instance, it was said that if
you do look up periodically and you see someone with a slight grin; their contribution adds to
your delight, your happiness, we're all truly getting a charge out of this current, that is dazzling,
it's a decent inclination6. An assembly hall that permits customary attenders to perceive their
companions regardless of whether spaces for continued discussion are confined, shows up to
cultivate a feeling of belonging, such that Music in the Round audience members felt themselves
to be 'important and engaged with the music'. The feeling of possessing a natural and notable
space appeared to be essential for the delight experienced by regular attendees, and the way that
3
A mixture of previously heard works, which included such varied repertory as Spohr’s Octet, Schoenberg’s
Verklärte Nacht, Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time, and Schubert’s Winterreise, as well as a range of quartets
and quintets by Mozart, Brahms, Britten, Tippett, and others.
4
For instance; “my family was middle-class, I was educated by a private tutor, my sister played the violin…”
5
Paul F. Berliner, Thinking in Jazz: The Infinite Art of Improvisation (Chicago, 1994), 459.
6
This comment reveals two important factors that make watching a concert an enjoyable activity; the visual impact
of performers and other listeners, and the collective experience of being part of an audience.

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 Maryse Abi Haidar, 201805087 E-Book Summary

practically all pieces of the scene were open to the crowd individuals probably added to this
sentiment of being 'at home'. In spite of the fact that there was a backstage region, the performers
were frequently to be seen talking with the crowd outside the Studio. Entertainers likewise joined
the crowd to tune in to pieces where they were not playing, thus the open doors for crowd and
entertainer connection were clearly a characteristic of the concert, esteemed by numerous
individuals of the regular attenders. However; such environments weren’t always suitable for
everyone7. Authors on theater design know about the importance of the energy of actors and
audience to be channeled, exchanged and uplifted through successful theater engineering,
however conversation of auditoria plan for music is commonly engrossed with acoustics, giving
little consideration to the social impacts of being in a common tuning in space. The uplifted
consciousness of listening space uncovered by the Music in the Round crowd recommends that
further examination into the effect of listening scenes is expected to assist with expanding
comprehension of melodic gathering and involvement with the show lobby setting.

Creating an Ethos: Dress Codes and Social Conventions:

Music in the Round is in no way a form in deserting the old artists' uniform8 of supper
coats and night wear, yet Christopher Small inquiries whether the now typical change to a
stylized adaptation of regular dress is a genuine sign of another connection among entertainers
and their crowds9. The audience frequently talked of the agreeableness and casualness of which
these shows were both a manifestation and a reason. Regular attenders felt themselves to be a
piece of an exceptionally complex and devoted crowd, however; even the friendliest audience
members recognized that social communications and interactions could be restricted10.

Musical preferences and priorities:

7
Some expressed that these interactions had nothing to do with the performance itself which was the main reason
for people’s presence at the concert hall.
8
During the performance, T-shirts in white, grey, or black, printed with the logo of the ‘20th anniversary’ festival,
were worn by all performers, and were also on sale to the audience.
9
Weeks after the performance, we could still perceive people who attended the show to be still dressed in the T-
shirts from previous festivals.
10
Because ‘friendliness’ during the festival was not the same as ‘friendship’, consisting mainly of recognizing
familiar faces across the auditorium rather than of more sustained social interactions.

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Taking the above into consideration, the most important aspect of a concert was and still
is the quality and variety of music heard. Music in the Round audience members were set up to
discuss a lot about their melodic preferences for ways that can be strikingly missing in other, all
the more obviously characterized kinds: audience members in an study by Gilbert and Sullivan
Festival, for instance, occupied with minimal basic discussion of the repertoire, highly esteeming
their information on a little scope of works as opposed to their readiness to draw in with new
performance or interpretations. The consistent factor at Music in the Round implied that
faithfulness to the performers urged numerous audience members to be bolder in their show
determinations, presenting them to new encounters that may in some way, or another have been
maintained a strategic distance from.

Learning and loyalty:

Numerous attenders felt that their insight and knowledge of chamber music had been
extended during their listening time, and saw the basic talks given by the performers assuming an
important part in building up their listening abilities and mindfulness. On another note, the
feeling of individual contact given by the discourse assists with building relationships between
performers and audience members that are esteemed by most of the crowd. Music in the Round
crowds reacted well to the narrative touch. Talks would in general utilize a minimum of a
specialized language, while expecting impressive information on repertory, a style that most of
the crowd plainly discovered suitable and accommodating.

Connecting the festival with everyday life:

Audience members who enjoys learning inside the festival are ready to tune in through
self-coordinated exercises: gathering and listening to CDs, exploring writers through books or
sites. A high extent of respondents reported taking instrumental or vocal lessons or participating
in music gatherings and symphonies. Music in the Round audience were saving in their
utilization of the term 'fan', which is after all more normally connected with the enthusiastic
abundances of the pop music world. The quality of associations between show participation and
day by day life give off an impression of being the deciding element in isolating easygoing
audience members from their more devoted friends, what's more, the side effects of more
elaborate listening are related to satisfaction: an excitement to purchase tickets, an ability to give
total need to participation, and a glad depletion toward the finish of a concentrated time of tuning

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 Maryse Abi Haidar, 201805087 E-Book Summary

in. Specialists, entertainers, and show advertisers could find out much about old style music
crowds through examination with the broader writing on mainstream music tuning in.

Conclusion: Being a participant listener:

This study has indicated the close connection among social and music enjoyment that is
at the core of participation, it is however given rather less consideration in regard to crowd
experiences. Audience have been appeared here to be committed, involved, and mindful,
introducing assessments and investigation that shed new light on melodic gathering and
experience. Attendance at celebration shows the ideal listening experience for some, and such
solid connections with the event make it difficult to isolate the impacts of the numerous
components that were pleasant for those audience; the private setting, the regular performers,
much-loved familiar repertory, new musical challenges and difficulties, and maybe most
importantly, the presence of like-minded audience in the crowd. Comparisons with other fine arts
would be valuable in enlightening the specificities of melodic experience; crowd reaction is
significantly more substantial and on-going for the entertainer than the artist, who must sit tight
for praise or remarks after a performance to gain a sense of how their work has been received.

Abstract:

Audience individuals' nerves for the fate of traditional music listening are examined, and
suggestions made for exploration and practice that could perceive all the more adequately the
focal part of the audience in contemporary melodic life. This article reports an examination of
crowd encounters at an orchestral arrangements celebration and looks at the manners by which
social and melodic enjoyment interface to produce commitment and a feeling of association in
the event.

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