What's That You Said?

The Importance of Curious Listening

 “Why should we worry about how many frets up a perfect fourth is if we can just play it on the next string?” In the midst of a theory lesson at the Music Lab, the kids

began their regularly scheduled interrogation of the facts at hand. Before it could get away from me, however, I jumped on an opportunity.

“Well, we don’t always have another string to play on, do we?” A pause. A few quizzical looks. 

“Who in the world plays with just one string?” came the anticipated retort—I had them just where I wanted them. Deftly, I jumped to the computer and pulled up Brushy One String’s famous performance of “Chicken in the Corn.” A roar of laughter and chatter erupted from the students, an immediate judgement made that the only thing to achieve with one-string was good comedy. 

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Admittedly, I hadn’t framed this as an opportunity to listen with open ears and minds—I, too, had long found Brushy’s technique to be amusing more than anything else. But as I explored his repertoire, I was blown away by the intricacies of his writing and the emotional weight of each

song. I paused to wonder, “how often do I listen with judgement rather than curiosity?”

When we listen with judgement, we don’t actually hear anything at all. By allowing our mind to immediately critique something, we let in our internal dialogue prematurely. This dialogue quickly begins chattering over whatever we’re trying to listen to, preventing us from absorbing it. In this way, when we judge first, we only ever hear a half-song: half music, half thoughts.

My challenge, for myself and for all of you, is to listen first with curiosity. Curiosity, at its core, is a state of pure awareness that allows us to absorb music as it is rather than as we see it. When we are curious, we are learning, changing, and growing—when we are judgmental, we just stay the same.

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