Communication and Listening

When hearing music being played – whether I’m a listener in the audience or a participant on the band stand – I really enjoy the interplay that can happen between the musicians. Most often, this is experienced in a “jazz” setting where improvisation is a key ingredient. The word jazz in the preceding sentence is in quotations, because there are so many definitions of that term. I do not consider myself a jazz purist and my intent in this post is to put that issue aside and talk about communication and listening during music making – jazz or otherwise.

I love to hear thoughts and emotions conveyed through musical ideas that originate with one player with another player answering back – a conversation, if you will. This goes way beyond simply taking a melody and/or rhythm and quoting it verbatim. What I’m talking about here, is a dialog between two or more musicians. Sometimes, people will wait their turns while someone is talking and other times, people start talking before someone has finished. The second person has something to say, and then the first person responds to that. It can go back and forth in many ways, but it can be big fun. If you’ve ever gotten together with a group of friends at a party, e.g., then you get the idea.

When I am in a situation where the opportunity exists for this sort of dialog, then I find myself concentrating on a high level (if I’m truly “in the moment”). I want my playing and my thoughts to directly relate to what I hear. I want to open up my ears to allow for surprises. I don’t know where the conversation is going, but I want to be listening and communicating as much as I can. Hopefully, I have something to add to this musical interchange while at the same time keeping time on the drum set in the style of the music being performed. My goal is to concentrate on listening to the entire group and the soloist more than I am concentrating on playing the drums (or least equally as much). It’s not always easy!

In an effort to understand this, I have found that it’s important to listen to recordings of great musicians. It’s fine to listen to the drummer, hear a cool drum fill and try to replicate that idea. Transcribing your favorite players can be really helpful. After that, go back and listen again and listen to everything. Try to understand why the drummer played that cool drum fill or beat. What happened that inspired that? Please keep that in mind and see if you can listen and communicate when you’re playing music. Have fun!