providing resources for all listeners
Everyday skills like listening are easy to overlook because we all use them all the time, but sometimes something dramatically shifts and all at once those everyday skills need to be redefined and re-worked. In the music world, smart devices and streaming services have radically changed our experience, making it easier than ever to access an entire world of music. But with this change, has our listening changed? The problem is we don’t have a definitive answer. The reason for that is simple–we have had no framework to comprehensively understand and teach music listening as a skill.
Approaches to Listening establishes a framework to describe and define listening, moving beyond the introductory terms “passive listening” and “active listening” by providing four distinct approaches, or filters, that can define any form of listening. Using this framework we can examine how our listening affects what we feel and think and how we can take charge of the entire process.
How you listen determines what you hear. What you hear determines how you feel and think.
Anyone can learn how to listen, and while my podcast is largely designed for academic musicians (those who perform and think about music professionally) the ideas behind it, which are taught in my mentoring and courses, are beneficial for any listener. Traditional music education is focused on performance or scholarship. Approaches to Listening offers an alternate option where you study music solely through the art of listening. No matter your level of training or experience, a study of listening will help you find a deeper understanding of and connection to music.
Our mission is to help listeners stay connected to the heart of their music by rethinking the role listening plays in their musical experience. We have found that current definitions of active listening are too narrowly focused, and fall short of creating a truly transformative listening experience. Our listening framework changes that.
All listening can fall under four filters, or approaches. These filters form the foundation for our framework:
The Critical Filter: used to critique music and make judgments about its value. It enables you to determine what you want and don't want in your music. Critique is essential to active listening, but it can be used as a defense mechanism against unfamiliar music, inhibiting your experience. When used properly, the critical filter enhances and deepens active listening.
The Analytical Filter: used to take a piece apart to examine its components and understand how they fit together as a whole. Analysis enables deep understanding, but can lead to sterile knowledge. When properly used, the analytical filter enhances all aspects of the musical experience by increasing your knowledge and understanding.
The Experiential Filter: used to feel a piece. This filter requires listeners to step away from thinking and focus on the visceral and emotional experience. The experiential filter is ethereal, not measurable, and hard to maintain as an active state of listening. It is also the gateway to the most poignant and powerful moments that music can offer. When properly used, the experiential filter makes music come to life inside the listener.
The Exploratory Filter: used to prepare to listen. To explore, a listener must widen their perception and suspend past experience or acquired knowledge that might inhibit their listening. The exploratory filter can move you beyond your current understanding and your current standards of experience.
Learn more about the 4 filters and how they can transform your musical experience on our podcast, Approaches to Listening, or by checking out our online courses.
I’ve been exploring the art of listening throughout my education, but there’s still a great deal of research to be done–research I’m anxiously pursuing. I hope you’ll join me in that pursuit by staying up to date with my work via my newsletter, or by participating in my first course offerings. While there’s a great deal to learn about listening I’m convinced of this: how we listen to music matters, and until you take charge of your listening you’ll never know just how much.
Meet our Founder
William Taylor is a collaborative pianist and listening coach. He graduated with his Master of Music in Collaborative Piano Performance from Texas Christian University in 2023, where he also received the Judith Solomon Award for vocal accompaniment. He is currently pursuing his Doctor of Musical Arts in Collaborative Piano Performance at University of North Carolina - Greensboro, class of 2026. He is a member of the Phi Kappa Phi and Pi Kappa Lambda honors societies and has worked as a pianist at Washington & Lee University and the Greensboro Opera. In his spare time William performs and records his favorite video game music, and continues his research into both video game music and listening.