Ways of Hearing: Reflections on Music in 26 Pieces

by Scott Burnham (Editor), Marna Seltzer (Editor), Dorothea von Moltke (Editor)

An outstanding anthology in which notable musicians, artists, scientists, thinkers, poets, and more --- from Gustavo Dudamel and Carrie Mae Weems to Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Paul Muldoon ---explore the influence of music on their lives and work.

Contributors include: Laurie Anderson ● Jamie Barton ● Daphne A. Brooks ● Edgar Choueiri ● Jeff Dolven ● Gustavo Dudamel ● Edward Dusinberre ● Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim ● Frank Gehry ● James Ginsburg ● Ruth Bader Ginsburg ● Jane Hirshfield ● Pico Iyer ● Alexander Kluge ● Nathaniel Mackey ● Maureen N. McLane ● Alicia Hall Moran ● Jason Moran ● Paul Muldoon ● Elaine Pagels ● Robert Pinsky ● Richard Powers ● Brian Seibert ● Arnold Steinhardt ● Susan Stewart ● Abigail Washburn ● Carrie Mae Weems ● Susan Wheeler ● C. K. Williams ● Wu Fei

What happens when extraordinary creative spirits--musicians, poets, critics, and scholars, as well as an architect, a visual artist, a filmmaker, a scientist, and a legendary Supreme Court justice--are asked to reflect on their favorite music? The result is Ways of Hearing, a diverse collection that explores the ways music shapes us and our shared culture. These acts of musical witness bear fruit through personal essays, conversations and interviews, improvisatory meditations, poetry, and visual art. They sound the depths of a remarkable range of musical genres, including opera, jazz, bluegrass, and concert music both classical and contemporary.

This expansive volume spans styles and subjects, including Pico Iyer's meditations on Handel, Arnold Steinhardt's thoughts on Beethoven's Grosse Fuge, and Laurie Anderson and Edgar Choueiri's manifesto for spatial music. Richard Powers discusses the one thing about music he's never told anyone, Daphne Brooks draws sonic connections between Toni Morrison and C�cile McLorin Salvant, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg reveals what she thinks is the sexiest duet in opera. Poems interspersed throughout further expand how we can imagine and respond to music. Ways of Hearing is a book for our times that celebrates the infinite ways music enhances our lives.

Genres: Music

216 pages, Hardcover

Published September 28, 2021

Reviews

[Vicky · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book came out of commemorating the 125th anniversary of Princeton University Concerts and features 26 reflections on music in whichever format the author chose, so there are mostly personal essays but also poems, interviews, conversations, and photographs.

I read this while on a long Amtrak ride and felt engaged, even though it was very mixed. My favorites were:
A Winter Drive by Edward Dusinberre
written by the first violinist of Takács Quartet, while he's driving to rehearsal in the cold in Colorado, reflecting on Schubert's String Quintet and what the collaboration is like. I thought the way this was framed was cool and gave me ideas since I wanted to write something similar, except from the pov of someone on a train, thinking about a piece of music that means something to me.

Arvo Pärt's Tabula Rasa by Corinna Da Fonseca-Wollheim
written by a music critic of NYT, discovering this piece by Arvo Pärt during a critical moment of trying to figure out who you are in life. I liked the technical details, as if I understood it. Moreso looking at how it's brought into the writing.

"Wusuli Boat Song" / "Water Is Wide" : History of a Cross-Cultural Duet by Abigail Washburn (banjo) and Wu Fei (guzheng)
I have a ticket to see Wu Fei perform this 23-24 season and was intrigued by her recordings with Abigail Washburn. It's so unexpected to hear a banjo and guzheng together. So I was excited to read this piece co-written by both of them explaining a little of where they came from and how they met. Their paths are so different and it's so cool they're able to collaborate.

A Long Song Log: Ten Entries on Seriality, to the Accompaniment of Charles Mingus's Black Saint by Nathaniel Mackey
This one was so good! I had reception and was able to put on the Black Saint and the Sinner Lady album on while reading this.

[Amber Manning · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Was it during the five-and-a-half minute bachanal starting at 11:59, the all-out, sixty-minute-man colomotion that takes the piece out, with its return to Dannie Richmond’s bass-drum-to-snare-drum-to-sock-cymbal figure and the tuba’s low croak, a rhapsodie hectoring, and to the piece’s opening theme an end? That the end is a beginning, the beginning an end, was it one was to take it, point wanted to know, that there’s a certain circularity to seriality’s deferred wholeness?” (Mackey, “A Long Song” 165).

[Jacob Williams · Rating 3 out of 5]

Music has that power to stitch lives to other lives without so much as blinking. -Alicia Hall Moran

Much of this book was lost on me, but one essay introduced me to the music of composer Steve Reich, and I'm inclined to agree with the author that it's absolutely perfect background music for intellectual work:

The feeling is ... utopian—might our world be like this one, after all? The possibility arises of a ramifying, fractal, infinitely generous attention, at all scales at once ... A work song for good work freely undertaken, carried along and carried through. -Jeff Dolven

Some of the other essays provided good recommendations too: Arvo Pärt's Tabula Rasa; Chopin's impressive Ballade No. 2, Op. 38. And there are some eloquent descriptions of particular music and of music in general. Richard Powers describes how Bach's Partita in D Minor created for him "a moment outside of time". Pico Iyer says listening to Handel's arias "reminds me that there's something beyond what I see and know". Brian Seibert notes that "to view a dance is to borrow the ears of the choreographer and the dancers."

The last essay has interesting thoughts on the role of "the spatial aspect of sound—the perceived location, extent, and movements of sound sources in surrounding space", making the case that this has been drastically underutilized in music due to technical limitations.

(crosspost)

[Witoldzio · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of the articles are really great, however, unfortunately, this book is very uneven in quality. I understand that there was a great variety of wonderful people with an impressive array of talents crafting it, but some of the people see music only as a a way through which they play with words, some of them are not that much into music at all. The best articles were those written by practitioners of music. Some of the articles seem rather superficial, however, some of the poems really good. So, take it as it is, but definitely don't expect too much, that was the mistake that I made when I decided to read this book. It is a great idea to have intellectuals and artists share their views on music. The idea needs to be defined better, the contributors need to be sent better guidelines.

[Theodora · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great collection of essays, poems, and art about music. I tried to listen to most of the pieces mentioned while I read about them, which was really cool. I especially liked hearing the musicians write about their experiences in string quartets and their relationships with particular pieces. I wish I could play in a string quartet or a violin duet!!

[Sam · Rating 1 out of 5]

god help me but the excessive use of big words and run on sentences was CRAZY. pretentious as hell I hated every second of it 😭

[Dylan Schulz · Rating 3 out of 5]

1 2 3 infinity, first essay by Richard Powers was great. everything else meh at best