Listening

How to improve your listening ability to music. Page 6

Dr. Alfred A. Tomatis (1920 – 2001) was an ear, nose and throat specialist. After the Second World War, he started studying the impact of occupational noise on the many persons who were suffering after the war. He found something outright revolutionary. In recognition of his discoveries, he was named Knight of Public Health of France in 1951 and in Brussels, in 1958, he received the gold medal for Scientific Research. He wrote 14 books, and numerous articles.

Over the years, Tomatis treated many famous people. Most of them wished to stay anonymous, but some have decided to come out in public. Among those are Maria Callas, Romy Schneider and Gérard Depardieu. His work centred mainly on autism, ADD, ADHD and dyslexia.

http://www.tomatis.com

In his research Dr. Tomatis found that good learners are always good listeners. Good learners have selective hearing: they can easily distinguish between the various frequencies that make up speech.

Good learners are right ear dominant. Many poor learners are left ear dominant. (This goes hand in hand with many other scientific researches. Beginners in music are also left ear dominant!) Good learners can zoom-in on sounds which are important, and filter out irrelevant information. Many poor learners, especially those who are hyperactive, cannot easily filter out irrelevant information.

To become a good learner one has to become a good listener!

Do take note of the fact that Dr. Tomatis also makes a clear distinction between hearing and listening! Good listeners hear the sounds and all their nuances correctly. Good listeners push irrelevant stimuli to the background. Good listeners focus and concentrate. Good listeners do not feel disturbed by the bombardment of sensory information we are all surrounded by. Good listeners sort and organize the relevant information into meaningful hierarchies.

Poor listeners, on the other hand, don't have the ability to "zoom out", and filter out irrelevant information. Poor listeners have only one defence against this continuous bombardment of information: to tune out. That is what ADD children and adults do.

Children with autism often suffer unbearable pain because of auditory hypersensitivity. When you "feel too much", you cannot pay attention. Unconsciously, you will cut off the source of your suffering and become aloof and detached.

Dr. Tomatis discovered that people who are right ear dominant learn much more easily than those who are left ear dominant. Tomatis also discovered that our ears control our speech.

High frequency sounds energize the brain, creating what Tomatis calls "charging sounds". But, low frequency sounds drain energy away and tend to wear us out. They make our bodies move, by activating the semicircular canals of the vestibule. If those sounds keep on, our bodies keep moving to the point of exhaustion. This effect can be observed easily in music with a predominant bass register pulse.
Dr. Tomatis found that most children or adults with a good musical ear get plenty of "Ear Energy", and rarely experience low energy or feelings of depression. But on the other hand, hyperactive children may be moving around constantly in an attempt to "charge" their brain through vestibular activities. People whose brains don’t "charge" well are likely to be at a disadvantage when confronted with the many challenges they face in a fast-paced society like ours.

You can test yourself with Dr. Tomatis' method by arranging a record with a sharp high pass filter at around 6-7 kHz and re-record a CD with that filter. (You need also some further compression and amplification of the sound). If you listen to the CD – with this quite unusual sound – you will after a while notice a clear improvement of your attention to details in music recorded in a normal way.
Please note, that this is not the method used by Dr. Tomatis. His work is carried out in a much more controlled fashion and includes an initial hearing test. But, still you can notice improvements in your listening ability with this simplified method. Try it, and I can promise you a rewarding experience.

I want to finish the listening pages by introducing the work of the Danish philosopher Martinus (1890 –1980).

Reading the enormous output of Martinus (more than 6.000 pages) might well change your entire life. You may rightly – and should be – a bit cautious, as this at first might appear to be a new religion. But to be cautious, according to Martinus, is to be intelligent. I can safely say that after years of reading his texts, the whole picture will fall into place in a surprising new way; a holistic experience that no other philosopher I have been in contact will give you. This may sound as an tremendous exaggeration. But, I can only suggest for you to read a bit for yourself.

Remember, there is no church or sect to be a member of. There is no institute to give your money in order to get to the next "level". In Martinus own words, the real truth cannot be inside any sect or be anyone's property to sell. The real truth is a science that will defend and explain everything. There are only books to read and no personal cult to follow. Only this last fact may make Martinus unique.

Martinus has written his books for the non-believer, even though many believers from different religions will be able to deepen their belief with his books. But, the non-believer, the individual who is looking for answers, is the true reader.

In this limited space it's quite impossible to go into Martinus' writings. But, among other things, he writes a lot about the development of the mind and the body (and almost on any other subject you can imagine). He clearly points out the path of the development of the mind, which goes from instinct, over raw power, over feeling towards intelligence, and further on to intuition. There are many other aspects working at the same time, and most important is how one is balancing these different energies in one's mind in daily life. It's a very complex issue, to say the least.

Every human being is always correct in his perception, but that particular perception is only a reflection of the relative development of that person's mind at any given moment. There are many levels of individual development which range from primitive to divine. But, the distance between the levels is actually an illusion, since they are dependent on our understanding of the principle of perspective. The principle of perspective is a natural law in nature, by which it's possible for us to view the world. According to this principle, something which for us seems either distant or close is neither of these things – it is just a temporarily created difference.

A good starting place for further reading is Martinus’s several books of symbols. His book are available in many languages.

For more information: http://www.martinus.dk/

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