Die Moldau-Listening with Reactions

Please listen to a Die Moldau by Bedrich Smetana (video is below) paying close attention to your imagination and your emotions. Listen once to get an overall impression of the piece. Then listen again, taking notes on your feelings, impressions, and imaginings. Make sure that your reactions are directly and sincerely connected to the moods and suggestions of the music – not just random. To do this, you must listen very carefully and actively, allowing your mind and heart to be fully present in the experience. I highly recommend listening with headphones because the piece has an extremely wide dynamic ranges (soft to loud) that you will not be able to hear if you listen on laptop speakers.

Write your response by giving a chronological account (time based) of your reactions, referencing the specific time segments that I list below. What emotion, story or scene do you hear expressed through the music? BE CREATIVE! Try to explain what it is specifically about the sound that is causing your reaction using musical terminology that we have learned in this course. For example: “The composer used woodwind instruments in a soft dynamic to create a mystical atmosphere. At this moment I imagined…”