Audiation Series, Part 2 -- The Stages of Audiation: An Overview

Edwin Gordon’s Summary of the Stages of Audiation:Stage 1: Momentary retentionStage 2: Imitating and audiating tonal patterns and rhythm patterns and recognizing and identifying a tonal center and macrobeats.Stage 3: Establishing objective or subjective tonality and meter.Stage 4: Retaining in audiation tonal patterns and rhythm patterns that have been organized.Stage 5: Recalling tonal patterns and rhythm patterns organized and audiated in other music.Stage 6: Anticipating and predicting tonal patterns and rhythm patterns.___________________________________My Summary of the Stages of Audiation:Stage 1: In our minds, we hear an “aftersound” of the music we just heard.Stage 2:* We mentally imitate all the pitches and durations we just heard;* Then we extract from those pitches and durations the ones we think are essential;* Then we group those essential pitches and durations into tonal and rhythm patterns;* And finally, based on the patterns we just organized, we discern macro beats and a pitch center.Stage 3: We discern the tonality and meter of the music we are hearing.Stage 4: We reassess the formal structure of the music we’re hearing based on the following: 1) repeated or varied phrases and sections; 2) modulations of tonality, keyality, tempo, and meter; and 3) changes in texture, timbre, and dynamics.Stage 5: We discern how musical elements develop in tandem — sometimes in cooperation, and sometimes in conflict — in ways that affect how we understand the phrase structure, sectional structure, and overall form of a piece of music. The elements may include tonality, keyality, harmony, melody, tempo, meter, melodic rhythm, dynamics, articulation, phrase structure, sectional structure, texture, register, and orchestration.Stage 6: We compare formal elements (tonality, meter, etc.) in the music we are hearing with those same elements in pieces we have heard before.Stage 7: As we listen to music, we foresee musical events such as phrase endings, modulations, and sectional changes. If we’re hearing familiar music, we anticipate such events; if we’re hearing unfamiliar music, we predict such events. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ericmbluestine.substack.com