In article ,
"Arny Krueger" wrote:

MINe 109 wrote:
In article ,
"Arny Krueger" wrote:

IME musicans seem to tend to be wary of listening to
recordings of their playing.

If it's a good recording, they don't need to, as it
matches the
intent.

This statement can be interpreted to mean that all good
recordings identically match the intent of the musican.

From the musician's view, yes, except for that pesky 'all' you've got
there.

If that's what you mean Stephen, you obviously can't hear
the forest for the trees.

No, just suggesting one possible reason a musician might not need to
hear a recording.

Maybe they don't want to hear your recordings.

That's often a fact. Again Stephen you seem to be trying to
talk your way out of the box you might be in.

This was not intended to be a discussion of whether or not
they want to hear themselves play. The question is "why".

The answer is pretty obvious to me. The recordings do a
pretty fair job of reproducing what happened during the
performance. The musicans lack the self-confidence it takes
to actually listen to what they have done. In short, they
know that they were pretty crappy, and they don't want to be
reminded of it, or the reasons why.

Then there's the smaller group of confident professionals who know what
they've done and have found recordings confirm their intent was realized.

Fact of the matter is that performers don't get a very good
idea of how the performance went. The better ones freely
admit that they are very preoccupied during the performance,
which frankly is what we listeners hope. We want them to be
preoccupied with providing their best possible performance.
That doesn't leave a lot left over to perceive the
performance as listeners do.

Not in the sense of enjoying the performance, no. However, performers
sometimes enter a zone of hyper awareness of their performance. Hearing
a recording can then be a shock because the performer is no longer in
that zone. And, insecurity aside, hearing the recording can produce
anxiety because the musician no longer has the power to change the
performance.

However, there's a macro view of the performance that is
very important By technical means, it is possible for a
performer to escape the limitations of the necessary
preoccupation with being a performer, and also be a
perceptive listener.

Musicians trained from an early age can be relatively unconscious of
their technique. Learning to listen can be tough for these types.

Stephen