Miles is typical of most students, I suppose, in how some subjects really appeal to them while others just don't. Historically he's been a big fan of math and science classes where he has always excelled. He's even been playing in the school band and orchestra (on flute and cello) for a few years each at this point, but the musical insight I gleaned from him did not at all come from these activities.

Instead, Miles has made a better connection with his language arts teacher this fall than in past grade levels. This is a subject where he hasn't often been a big fan though it seems he's been well paired with an instructor who is making his English studies much more interesting this time around. For example, it has long been a challenge to get him to read much of anything at all; in the past two months he's already made it deep into the sixth installment of a very popular wizarding book series. There's no way at the start of this school year I'd have dreamed that he'd absorb over two thousand pages of anything so rapidly. It's been fun to see him consume these books and to share vicariously the new plot developments; long known to us, but brand new to him. 

As joyous as this new love of reading has become, his challenges and resistance towards writing still persists to a degree. Then one day he brought an analogy home from his teacher, telling me that they were encouraged to think about reading and writing as if they were breathing. Reading is breathing in, inhaling, taking in information. Writing, on the other hand, is the response to reading, the breathing out, exhaling. 

His casual sharing of his teacher's curious breathing metaphor stopped me dead in my tracks. I immediately drew a parallel with my broader musical experience where listening becomes breathing in and performing breathing out.

Yes, as a trombonist I am literally required to breathe in and out for my instrument to function, but as a musician I've often been in that place where I'm breathing out so very much more than I'm breathing in. Having performances, rehearsals and sessions to play, while also having arrangements and publications to produce, most of my efforts end up focused outward. It's as if I'm needing to exhale all the time and depleting all of my reserves without stopping very often to take a breath in.

And it's even difficult to take that time to stop and engage with music as a listener when one's profession is that of the performer. I can't even begin to count the number of concerts I've attended where I’ve felt at least some degree of frustration that I wasn't on the stage as that's the place I usually reside. 

Once on a trip home from a performance, my bandmate wanted to share a recording that was resonating strongly with him at that time: one featuring a gospel choir. He didn't realize that I had just recently finished a large transcription project, a songbook publication for a nearly identical group. As he played it on the van’s speakers I had to disappoint my bandmate, revealing upon inquiry (“isn’t this amazing?”) that his track wasn't at all inspirational for me…it “sounded like work." 

Many of my fellow musicians have similarly confided in me the difficulty of removing some unspoken obligation from the act of listening. For a working musician, so often the very purpose of listening to a particular recording is coupled with the preparation for an upcoming performance. The act of listening for pleasure, for breathing in, becomes a challenge surrounding all of the other hectic time commitments associated with it, such difficulties compounded by the additional daily obligations of our own busy lives. Even with the wealth of options available to us, the bandwidth for casually playing music on the car stereo or earbuds is often eschewed (by many I’ve spoken with) in favor of news or sports radio, podcasts, or audiobooks. 

So how do we go about breathing in? The joy of music is what got us started on a path towards this profession in the first place; how do we go about finding ways to tap into that newness and excitement without automatically dropping into work mode? Now I won’t promise any solutions here (your mileage may vary) and these anecdotes are completely non-scientific and non-academic results from my own personal experience and observations, but here are a few approaches I’ve encountered that seem to be worthwhile avenues to pursue:

Creating or nurturing a time and place for listening: 

During one of my dry spells of decidedly inadequate listening habits, a quirky confluence of events brought about a listening regimen that continues (to varied degrees) to this day. Over a winter break a few years ago I had some Christmas gift money burning a hole in my pocket. One somewhat questionable-looking online retailer was offering a vinyl record grab bag that featured a half-dozen new and sealed pressings of classic Jazz albums chosen at random. I took a chance even though I hadn’t spun anything on my turntable in over a decade. Lo and behold, the package arrived and I was so giddy upon opening the package to find some truly great recordings in the mix. After digging my turntable out of storage, the first disc I put on was Dave Brubeck’s “Time Out” album. When the stylus first thunked its way into the lead-in groove, I was met at once with the quietest silence I can recall (fresh vinyl is a treat, I tell you!), followed by the joyous strains of “Blue Rondo à la Turk” hammering a clear path straight out of my speakers and into my ears…or lungs. 

Audio fidelity aside (that’s a blog post for another day…), I’ve also come to appreciate the experience of the vinyl format as there’s less opportunity for distraction, making for a more determined session of focused listening. No skipping around between digital tracks, no fractured YouTube clips interrupted by ads; once you start a side it plays straight through to the end without stopping. Any time I put an LP on deck I make a personal commitment to listen without interruption and to live in the experience, welcoming the music as it plays out in real time. The use of physical media shouldn't be a limiting favor at all - other formats should work just as well with a conscious determination not to skip around, of course - but I’ve been able to find a measure of that childlike joy of music when deciding to slap a beloved record down on the player and just take the time to breathe it in.

Disassociation:

In a chat with a colleague who primarily performs within the sphere of classical orchestral music, he told me that his listening habits are best served when he takes in genres of music that are furthest removed from anything he’d ever be called upon to play. While thrash metal and trance/EDM aren’t his favorite musical genres, the separation of any work requirement allows him to separate himself from any musical training or obligation and to just enjoy taking things in as a casual listener. 

My colleague’s mention of unliked genres reminded me of a long solo drive to a gig up north when I stumbled upon a classical music radio station featuring a modern composer in residence (I regret that I didn’t take note of her name at the time). While I historically am not the biggest fan of the avant-garde in music, this long string of atonal and experimental piano works had me transfixed. I rapidly abandoned trying to analyze anything I was hearing and instead welcomed the experience with the cacophony of sound textures flowing about in the air around me. The interstitial discussions between the composer and interviewer introducing and exploring the works were fascinating and, for once, I realized that I wasn’t working while listening. I had no need to transcribe anything as I heard it. No way would I ever have the need to be part of any performance of this. The experience of breathing in something unique and unusual found me driving slower in the far right lane to try to keep myself within terrestrial radio broadcast range for as long as I possibly could. 

Intentionally remaining receptive when opportunities arise:

While I feel comfortable enough in the musical roles I regularly need to play on stage, the less familiar part of my musical experience anymore is that of an audience member. I’ve become so conditioned to the idea that a music event is a participatory activity where I’m supposed to be supplying a part of the music that it’s difficult to go into a receptive mode. This often finds me functioning as if my role as an audience member is that of a temporarily and unjustly displaced performer. While a challenge, it’s necessary for me to intentionally place myself into a receptive listening role for the duration. Rather than sitting in critique of a performance or in analysis of arranger-ly things like chord choices or voicings, I’ll make the conscious effort to take advantage of the rare opportunity to be in “breathing in” mode, to be mindful to experience what’s happening as a present experience to enjoy a different role than what my “day job” normally entails rather than a means for disappointment or regret.

Taking the metaphor as far as we can, it was also made clear to my son's fellow language arts students that you can't breathe out without first breathing in…that it's necessary to both inhale as well as exhale. Much as breathing involves inhaling and exhaling concurrently, every performance involves both listening as well as playing. The most basic mechanics of making music must incorporate elements of listening for pitch, tempo, blend, articulations, etc. Beyond these, there are the other elements of interaction with other players such as in jazz improvisation where both soloist and accompaniment make adjustments to their playing to better serve the music that’s happening in the air at that moment. One such moment landed on me during a wedding band gig. The song we were finishing plays out with 8 bars of a cappella vocals hovering around a tonic chord…nothing left for the horns or rhythm section to do for the rest of the tune. This time around, our stellar keyboardist started goofing around with a Rhodes patch accompanying the vocals with a string of some of the craziest chord extensions and substitutions I ever experienced on a pop music gig. As much as I’m usually able to mentally transcribe music on the fly, this small snippet of music happening in that moment went beyond my capability to analyze on the fly. Besides grooving hard in the moment, I had a quick thought on how that experience felt…that being unable to immediately grasp the mechanics of what I was hearing is maybe not that unlike what other audience members might feel in response to what I’m sharing with them. Not listening for work, or knowledge, or vocabulary building, but just taking it in. Feels pretty nice, this music thing.

I realize that teachers learn things from their students all the time, as parents often learn from their kids. Often these unsought bits of knowledge pay off in ways we’d never expect. I hope you can be mindful to welcome the experience of music at whatever level your journey allows, or needs.

I thank you for hanging with me this long as I wrap up this exhalation of a writing task I hope is worthy of my son's language arts teacher. Maybe it’s time for me to pull out that Dave Brubeck album again for a nice musical breath of fresh air.