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Listening Skills

Cultivating Active Musical Engagement

Listening Skills

Active listening is a foundational skill that transcends mere hearing; it involves focused engagement with music for a specific purpose or aim. This stands in clear contrast to passive listening, which is akin to simply 'hearing' music played for enjoyment or to fill silence. The importance of listening skills is widely recognized, forming a vital part of the early years national curriculum  and undergoing continuous development throughout a student's schooling. These foundational auditory skills are then specifically applied to music, encompassing both critical engagement with recorded compositions and insightful reflection on students' own musical creations. Within the Triquetrae Programme, active listening is particularly emphasized in the Grow Zone and Explore Zone, where students are encouraged to investigate diverse musical themes, cultural expressions, and sonic landscapes.


While young musicians possess the remarkable potential to engage with multiple musical elements simultaneously and discern various threads within a complex piece, this advanced ability often develops incrementally with age and extensive prior listening experience. Therefore, it is often highly beneficial to initially focus on a single element within a lesson, allowing for concentrated development. This focus could be directed towards pitch, timbre, form, dynamics, or any other specific musical aspect. Crucially, creative listening experiences serve to expose students to entirely new concepts and sounds, broadening their musical horizons and deepening their appreciation.

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All concepts and ideas on this site are copywritten by Stalybridge Music Academy (©2025), Chris Caton-Greasley (© 1991) & Andru Brumpton-Turner (© 2012)

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