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The musician's language learning
advantage:
More than just "good hearing"
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I have often been struck by the many parallels there are between
learning music and learning languages. They say that musicians have a
special talent for picking up new languages, and I do believe that in
general, this is true. I could name many famous classical musicians who
speak several languages with relative ease. Normally, we attribute this
ability to the musician's superior listening skills, and this is no
doubt part of it: the more we train ourselves to listen carefully, the
better we will be able to pronounce foreign words, for example.
But I think there are other reasons for this as well,
(apart from more acute listening skills) that have to do with the way
musicians practice the music they will later play in public. I myself
am a musician (a harpsichordist), and I have often thought about
exactly what steps I go through to learn a piece. (Even if you do not
play an instrument, don't hesitate to read on: I promise not to burden
you with any technical terms!)
When I decide to learn a piece of music, I first look it
over, and read (play) through it, in order to get a general idea of how
I want to go about practicing it. This is similar to when we first
listen somewhat more closely to a foreign language we would like to
learn, and perhaps have a look at some text in that language, too.
Upon starting with the "work" phase, I usually break the
music down into smaller parts, "phrases", or somewhat larger sections.
Then, I begin playing that section quite slowly, doing my best to make
every note sound as it should, since I want each to be clearly
distinguishable, and also to fit naturally into the phrase. If, after
playing this section through the first time, I hear that some things
just don't "sound right", I begin to ask myself why. Could it be that I
am not shaping the phrase correctly? Perhaps I'm placing accents where
they don't belong? Or have I chosen to play certain notes with the
"wrong" fingers (that is, maybe it would sound more natural if I played
those notes with another fingering). At times, several problems occur
in one small section. Occasionally, what sounds like a big problem can
be smoothed out by making one seemingly minor change in how I'm playing
it. If I'm lucky, there aren't any problems at all: in this case, I'll
repeat the section a few times to get it "in the fingers" (another way
of saying "in my tactile memory"), and I then move on to the next
section.
When I go about studying a language, I basically take the
same steps: I first look over the material I want to learn that day,
then start with a small section of it. I pronounce the new words. If I
hear that they somehow don't sound right, I analyze why this may be.
Could it be that I'm not forming my lips or mouth in the right way? Is
the tongue positioned as it should be to enunciate the sound well? When
I've identified the problem, I make corrections, and keep trying till I
get it right. When I do, I'll go over that section a few more times,
then move on. Should a section be easy, I don't spend much time on it,
but continue with the next part.
In music, once you've worked through the entire piece
section by section, you naturally want to play it in its entirety. On a
good day, it will soon be sounding rather good. But on occasion, even
though you've practiced every section carefully, the piece sounds
somehow "funny" when you play it through to the end. Maybe the tempo
(speed) isn't right; you might try to play it faster, or slower. Or
worse: it could be that you suddenly realize that your playing is
devoid of all emotion! If so, it's best to take a break and continue
later, since it's hard to force yourself to "feel".
Something similar can happen with a language, and this
phenomenon never ceases to amuse me. Once, I had my French teacher go
over a single sentence with me. I insisted that she not be satisfied
until I say every single word exactly the way a Frenchman
would. After some time, I was able to say each word perfectly; she
assured me that each word I uttered sounded just like a Frenchman would
say it. However, when I then said the entire sentence, I had an accent:
though each word was enunciated perfectly, I didn't make the sentence
"flow" the way a Frenchman would. It took a while longer for her to
teach me that, too. After a few more minutes of "training", I got it
right. I could say that sentence perfectly in every way. But as soon as
I read the next sentence, my non-French accent was once again perfectly
obvious!
Just as it's important to have the "feel" of a piece of
music in order to play it well, you must also learn the "feel" of a
language. I think that far too many people put off this phase of their
foreign language training for too long. If, from the beginning, you
learn how to pronounce not only the single words, but also entire
sentences - getting the "feel" for the proper "flow" of each phrase -
you will have a huge head start as far as true mastery of the language
is concerned. Following the example musicians give us will doubtlessly
be of great use to you here:
- First, look over the material to be studied
- Listen carefully to how it should sound (with the help of a
teacher,
or CDs)
- Start with a small part, then, ask yourself if you're getting
it right
- If not, ask yourself why not, find out the reason(s), make
corrections and try again and again till
it's as close to perfect as
possible.
- Do the following sections the same way
- When you've finished the material you want to cover for that day,
go over it from beginning to end, to make sure you
remember it
well. Read everything aloud at a somewhat more rapid pace,
making
sure that your pronunciation doesn't suffer while doing so.
And just as a musician will usually come back to the
pieces he/she learned during previous days or months in order to
"freshen up" the music in his/her mind, it will help you if, after
working though a number of chapters of your language book, you then go
back to the beginning and start reviewing the basics.
You may, or may not, have superior listening ability. No
matter: if you follow these steps in each and every one of your
language learning sessions, your speaking skills will no doubt improve.
You see, you don't have to be a musician to master your favorite
foreign language!
Next article:
19) Should we
learn a foreign language as children do?
Write to
David at:
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