For me, yes there is a benefit. Though I like a whole array of bands and genres (except for rap), I tend to listen more to bands or singer/songwriters who are more musically inclined, and who obviously have more talent. That is just my opinion of those artists though.

Because I am a music major in university, I've taken classes in aural skills training and music analysis. I like to (and usually tend to) pick out the minor details in a song or orchestral piece rather than the obvious things like the basic I-IV-V chord structure. This enables me to pratise my skills. I don't have perfect pitch (most people don't) but being able to differentiate between small intervals and chord changes is extremely important. This skill also makes one a well-rounded musician.

Being able to analyze music is both a good skill and an annoying one, for me anyways. Good being that I can listen to a song a few times and be able to deconstruct it, and bad being that I will listen to the same song and find things that are not in tune, poor vocal harmonies, unsteady tempo, etc.

There is no such thing as a "bad" composition. Even rap music can have a good rhythm structure. During the late 19th century, tonality was dissolved gradually, leading to atonality and Schoenberg's 12-tone compostions during the early 20th century. Because of this development, anything goes. John Cage's "Music of Changes" for piano, or even 4'33", are not bad compositions. They fall under the genre of chance music, and Cage's works were quite good. That's just an objective view of music, as everyone's tastes are different.

Even a style of music based almost entirely around rhythm can have a good rhythm structure? Crazy! :laughing:

http://www.musicbanter.com/talk-inst...nstrument.html

opposite sides of the same coin

I'm still trying to understand the guitar and ukulele... so it really hasn't affected the way I listen to music.

For me it does and it drives me crazy. A lot of the time when I listen to music I listen out for what key it is in, what time signature it is in, what the chord progressions are like, and wonder if I could play it. It also means that sometimes I am way to critical of songs because I can pick out musical blunders.

That being said, I can also just sit back and enjoy a song for what it is without getting into the musical technicalities. Some musicians (e.g. my flatmates) are so picky when it comes to music that they tear everything a part and have ridiculously high standards. I'm glad I'm not like this.

Listening to music like that probably makes about 80% of music unlistenable for them. What do they do, restrict themselves to perfect classical compositions and/or awful yet technically perfect metal?

Pretty much!

Haha. Poor saps... don't know what they're mssing

mmmhmmm

It does, and from what I can see, it drives other people absolutely mental - but I love it!!!

I got my degree many years ago, and took so many exams in music that I've forgotten what qualifications I have. I hated all the exams, because the sudy of music back then (maybe it's the same now) was so clinical that I thought most of my tutors entirely missed the point - a piece of music is only "good" if it affects you personally in a way you like - END OF STORY.

However, by learning the intricacies and the amazing stuff that composers did back in the day (almost entirely before the 20th Century), I realised that there are two kinds of good.

1) The first one I identifed. If you like it, it's good. That is not up for question.

2) A piece of music can be a good composition, even if you don't like it. That is also, at the top level of "good composition", not up for question, as through analysis and quantification, we can prove beyond reasonable doubt that the composition is good.

Analysis seems to be a double-edged sword for many - I'm extremely glad to find myself not hampered by it in the slightest, but am aware it can really annoy people if you pick apart their favourite music and prove it to be musically weak. :D

If I analyse one of my favourite songs - say, something by AC/DC, whose music I really, really dig - and find it musically weak, then that doesn't spoil my enjoyment of it - why should it? I like the song!

However, if I really don't like a song, analysis makes it easy to rip apart - a true analyst can find something wrong with anything.

It's important to keep perspective here, and switch the analysing ears off before listening to something new - if you've learned how to analyse and hear something unfamiliar, the temptation is always to lean towards over-analysis, and identify what is wrong before identifying what you like about it. Analysts are such cynics - I know... :P

In the case of AC/DC, what's to like is the tone of the guitars. MMMMMMMMMMMMMmmmmm!!!!

Then there's the overall sound of how the band mesh together - very small details in the music, not the chord progressions, which tend to be very simple; E.g. Where the accent falls on or off the beat in the various parts, maybe a steady bass line with ever so slightly syncopated guitar rhythms laid over the top, and these may build subtly (yes, you read right!) to a climax.



Never mind that the guitar is out of tune and the tempo a bit pedestrian compared to the studio version - you can feel that AC/DC are on fire, in a rock and roll sense - there's complete band synergy. Analyse THAT!


***If you like a piece of music, you don't have to justify why - but it's really cool to be able to***