How to develop good listening skills ?

Another challenge seen with both new and even experienced drummers & musicians is the tendency to rush into the song or lose the beat during play. In younger kids especially this is very difficult to control even if they are able to pick up the technique. The best way to address this challenge is to develop good listening skills that build your internal clock and enables you to play with total conviction

So what is the difference between hearing and listening? Hearing is passive, while listening is active. Listening to music enables you to learn the fundamental elements of music, such as form, melody and rhythm, through which you can come to understand and appreciate many types of music  

Pianist Paul Lewis says: ‘Hearing is something that most of us are fortunate enough to be able to do with no problem. However, to listen perceptively – without preconceptions or expectations – is a real challenge for anybody, and is something that requires patience, skill, and an infinite amount of practice!’

So here are Five Teaching Tips to encourage active listening (Source: Music motion blog)

1. Ask kids to listen closely to a musical selection of choice with their eyes open; then listen to the same selection with their eyes closed. Have them discover and discuss the differences. 

2. Ask kids to listen & focus on a different elements of the song: the melody, rhythm, harmony, tempo, instrumentation, lyrics, etc. and discuss afterward their findings. Then have them re-listen to the work. This presents a challenge not only of hearing but of remembering the sequence of musical events, and also of learning to articulate in words what they hear.

3. Ask kids to move to the music, conveying either the feelings the music provokes in them, or what they interpret the music to be expressing. You will be amazed at how instinctive young children are at understanding the underlying gestures, emotions, and movements of the music.   They “get” music a lot easier than adults, because their ears at this age are little sponges on steroids, soaking up the world around them.

4. Give your kids some periods of total quiet during the day. (And turn off that TV and stereo at night too!). We live in a noisy, nonstop roar of invasive sounds.  Without periods of silence, kids learn to automatically shut down their hearing in order to protect themselves from the noisy onslaught of the world around them.  So surround active listening experiences with quiet times, so kids learn when and “how to turn on their ears.” Otherwise, the defense mechanism of shutting out the noisy world and learning “how not to listen” is the result of a non-stop background of sound (even music).

5. Link the eyes and ears for intensive listening. This can best be experienced at live musical events. Try to link the visual source with the sound, so your eyes help you listen. That is one reason attending live  performances is always better than recorded media. A child will experience a live concert with his whole being and memory apparatus. Listening to a recording is not the same thing. The intensity and the immediateness of live music are essential. Let the eyes assist the ears, rather than distract them. It takes visual as well as aural discipline to sharpen our listening skills.