Various Ways to Enjoy Classical Music: Listening with a Focus on Composers
No matter how great a masterpiece is, it was written by a human being, a composer.
While you are certainly drawn to the works themselves, aren't you perhaps more interested in the composers first?
As a fellow human being,
"How could they have written a piece like this?"
"What kind of person were they, really?"
If there is someone who wants to know these things and would like to start listening to classical music from that perspective, I would recommend the following:
"Listening with a focus on composers"
is a way to enjoy it.
It is certainly one possible approach.
For example, regarding someone I know,
they watched the Mozart biographical film "Amadeus".
I see, I had heard he was a genius, but was he really that kind of man?
There was a man who, having vaguely listened to his music before, decided to listen to his works again in earnest, starting from the beginning.
This was during the Mozart boom several decades ago, and he was determined to listen to all 626 pieces listed in the Köchel catalogue.
On the other hand, there was someone who said they preferred lesser-known composers and became obsessed with modern British composers like Delius and Vaughan Williams; a young lady who was devoted to Chopin because she loved the piano; and a unique student who only listened to Beethoven because they were drawn to his way of life.
All of them are fascinating classical music fans who have their own opinions not only about the works but also about the composers.
When listening with a focus on composers as they do, I imagine how that enjoyment might develop, and a few directions come to mind.
First, the orthodox approach is to listen to the works of a composer you are drawn to, one by one.
If possible, one might consider listening to their entire body of work.
This is one way to think about it.
To find out what kind of works he wrote, music dictionaries (specifically,
"Dictionary of Classical Music Works, 3rd Edition" edited by Kazuo Inoue
"Encyclopedia of Classical Music Appreciation" (Kodansha Academic Library) by Keiichiro Jimbo
"New Revised Standard Music Dictionary, 2-Volume Set" by Ongaku no Tomo Sha
"Grout/Palisca: A History of Western Music (Vols. 1-3)" by Donald Jay Grout and Claude V. Palisca, translated by Kosaku Toguchi, Motoyuki Teranishi, and Eisuke Tsugami
are recommended) and similar resources will make it immediately clear.
Following this, I think it is common to start with representative masterpieces and gradually move on to lesser-known works.
For some composers like Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, and Chopin, their complete works are commercially available in the form of "complete collections."
This means you can listen to them all together.
If you can become that absorbed in the works, naturally, the next thing you should be interested in might be the composer's personality.
You will surely want to know about their upbringing, life, friendships, romances, marriages, personality, way of thinking, anecdotes, and so on.
And then,
"So this is the kind of person the composer I was interested in was."
I think you will come to realize this, along with their works.
I imagine anyone would probably progress to this point, but if I may be greedy, I think it would be even more interesting to broaden your interest a little further.
In other words, you have come to know or imagine quite a lot about that particular composer.
Next, what were the circumstances of the era and the social environment surrounding him?
In other words, if you expand your scope to include his position in history, or what other composers appeared around the same time as him, his image will likely become even clearer.
This is because a composer like him did not suddenly appear in music history; he was always influenced by the previous era and was born or survived out of that historical necessity.
Otherwise, it would be impossible to explain why Debussy or Ravel did not appear immediately after Mozart or Beethoven, or why they did not become Stravinsky or Shostakovich.
So, even if you fall in love with just one composer, there is a great deal to pursue if you want to know everything about them.
However, if you like them, spending time on that is enjoyable, and as you do so, I think your knowledge and interest will escalate before you know it.
As mentioned above,
"No matter how you get into it, if you become absorbed, other things will naturally follow."
That is what I meant by that.
To summarize once more, if you become interested in a specific composer, please start by learning about their works, their life, and so on.
Then, please try to learn as much as you can about the composers who influenced them and those they influenced.
Furthermore, if you also look at their position within their era, their achievements, and the social circumstances surrounding them, that would be perfect (^^♪
I believe that the way to enjoy music centered on a composer is that the materials for doing so—such as dictionaries, magazines, and catalogs—are all readily available.
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