ABSTRACT
A brief sketch of the neuroanatomical nature of music perception reveals aspects which are of particular interest to the discussion of ‘aural skills’ teaching. Particularly, the active nature of sound processing from the very start of music reception and throughout all its successive stages; the subjective element that is at work when hearing music, e.g. when projecting metre onto a rhythm, or filling in a missing fundamental; the holistic and at the same time specialised character of auditory processing, which involves assigning aesthetic, social, or emotional meaning to music; the ubiquity of grouping across all stages of music perception, from hearing a single complex sound to hearing whole works, that serves in making incoming sound meaningful; the partially ‘automatic’ character of auditory processing on the one hand, and the narrowing and intensifying effects of conscious attention on the other. All of these traits, creating a complex picture of aural perception, have significant implications for ‘aural skills’ pedagogy.
