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Posted by Romy the Cat on
04-21-2018
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I have a constant straggle with my wife. We have to a great
degree similar musical tastes and generally we love to listed music together.
After all, we met because we both admire Bruckner. However, we have very different
patterns how she and I listen music home. This was a source of many debates and
arguments and to a degree moved us to a situation when I tend do not listen
music together. It is primary because of me as I detest her listening style
more then she detests mine.
Most of my life I am accustom to the setting when I am in my
listening chair listening music I solely dedicated to the listening activity. I
might do something else but if I do I clearly feel that I was not music
listening but just being in room where music is playing. If I am interested in a
specific work or a specific interpretation then my mind switches to a single activity
mode and I very much prefer not to be distracted internally or externally.
Amy does it very different. When she listens music in our
playback room she very seldom does just listening. She tends to have a computer
with her, a book, a magazine or anything else that in my mine is a hugely prohibitive.
For whatever reason I feel very offended when she does it. I made her a few
times just to sit in the listening chair and juts to listen. She very much enjoyed
it BUT it happens always under my supervision and under my micro-managerial control.
Still, if she free to do what she wants then mostly the definition of “good
time” for her is to sit in the listening room, play Bach and to read the stupid
“New York Times”.
I understand that a smartest way would be to have a compromise
when we are together, I am listening my music and she is next to me browsing
shoes online. The problem is that for whatever reason it makes me very angry.
Even if I convince her just to be with me and juts to listen music together
then she slowly begins to reposition her body in the setting that in my view
not suitable for music listening. It annoys me. I hugely enjoy when she is laying
on my laps or jumps like a monkey all over me but I would like us to be
together just listening our music. After all she doe not behave like this
during live concerts…
I wonder if it is a general difference between men and women
or it is just me and my Amy? All of my former women with whom I dealt where not
truly interested for me from musical perspective. Even if they were interested
I did not care about them too much and I did not want to be with them while I
am listening my music. With Amy it’s
very different. I want her to be in my life organically intertwined with my
musical experiences. It makes me to feel her deeper and it tremendously enriches
my music. I just wish we did not have so different ways to consume music from
playback…
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Posted by Paul S on
04-21-2018
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or Learn to Live With It.
In June 2018 (if we don't kill each other first) my wife and I will celebrate 50 years of marriage. She loves music primarily for its rhythmic values, and she does not want to be sitting when listening to music, except at certain live performances. Classical music is just noise to her. She has been pretty tolerant about my overbearing hi-fi systems, but in houses where I have a whole room for hi-fi she has chipped away at me with respect to "decorating", which is FAR more important to her than hi-fi. My constant experiments and driver testing and the gear all over the place bug her, and every once in a while, she says something about it. As far as "deep listening", this has always been a solo activity for me. I look at her lately and realize I love her more than ever. I realize I am a fringe nerd, while she is poised and fairly social, and I'm glad she puts up with me. Plus, she is a great cook!
Best regards,
Paul S
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Posted by rowuk on
04-21-2018
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My wife also does not ever treat listening at home as a special opportunity. If it is choral music, she will often sing along. If it is orchestral music, she will talk to me about unrelated issues. I listen alone. Nothing else works.
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Posted by kodomo on
04-22-2018
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I guess I am the lucky one! I met my wife through music, we both were writing ambient/experimental stuff back then but did not have much of a chance to have face to face time, just exchanging music and being in different cities, well... Fast forward 8 years later, we met again, fell in love and got married. She is really interested in music although she is an academic and a doctor of economics.
I also tend to listen to music very quiet and only listening to music doing nothing else. She has told me, she loves this and feels like she feels like she was not listening to music properly before. She finds me turning all the lights off a little too much but thats ok. We have found a solution to that. We have an ambient light now, which lights the vertical moss garden in between speakers and I still can get lost in music looking at this greenery with nothing else lit in the room.
I guess I was very lucky here but when we met I already had my full scale horn system so she knew what she was getting into. She has always said, me being this much invested in sound and building my own system and room passionately is one of the things that rose her interest in me 
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