We can hear the melody of a song we are familiar with, sort of “in our head”. We might sing along to it. And for musicians who are familiar with the written music, we can even ‘see’ the music score as we playback the melody in our head.
We don’t only experience the melody of a song, it is the whole song – harmonic, rhythm as well as the melody. The melody is one part.
Without knowing it, we do also hear the harmony of the particular song, the way the harmony sounds at that particular point for that particular song. For example, can you recall, and do you hear or feel the harmony / chords of:
- Start of chorus This is our God, the Servant King, from From Heaven You Came (The Servant King)
- First line Be Thou my Vision O Lord of my Heart.
- Start of chorus Shout to the Lord, all the Earth, From My Jesus My Saviour,
- First line Joy to the World! The Lord is Come.
- Feed me till I want no more, in second last line, 1st verse of Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah , where the tenor echoes “want no more” with rising notes almost like trombones in celebration.
The point is, I believe many of us hear the harmony in our head more than we acknowledge. What we “hear” might not be close to what is “original” (in CD or video, as your church musicians play it), but it is not too far off. The more familiar you are with the song, the closer your audio and visual re-enactment.
This is a good point to make. We should make full use of how we practice music “in our heads” when we are away from our musical instruments. For musicians, this is a part of our meditation.
