Chapter 2 - Sound of Music Part I - Evelyn Glennie Listens to Sound without Hearing It

  Chapter 2 - Sound of Music

Part I - Evelyn Glennie Listens to Sound without Hearing It

Thinking about the text

I. Answer these questions in a few words or a couple of sentences each.

1. How old was Evelyn when she went to the Royal Academy of Music?

2. When was her deafness first noticed? When was it confirmed?

Answer:

1. Evelyn was seventeen years old when she went to the Royal Academy of Music.

2. Her deafness was first noticed when she was eight years old. But it was confirmed when she was eleven.

II. Answer each of these questions in a short paragraph (30–40 words).

1. Who helped her to continue with music? What did he do and say?

2. Name the various places and causes for which Evelyn performs.

Answer:

1. Percussionist Ron Forbes helped Evelyn to continue with music. He began by tuning two large drums to different notes and said, “Don’t listen through your ears, try to sense it some other way.” 

2. Evelyn performs at regular concerts. She also gives free concerts in prisons and hospitals. She also gives high priority to classes for young musicians.

III. Answer the question in two or three paragraphs (100–150 words).

1. How does Evelyn hear music?

Answer:

Evelyn hears music by sensing the notes in different parts of her body. Ron Forbes, her trainer, turns two drums to different notes and asks her not to listen it through her ears but sense it in some other way. Then, she realizes that she could feel the higher drum from the waist up and the lower drum from the waist down. She learns how to open her mind and body to sounds and vibrations. Repeating the same exercise with Forbes, Evelyn starts discovering that she can sense certain notes in different parts of her body. When she plays the xylophone, she can sense the sound passing up the stick into her fingertips. By leaning against the drums, she can feel the resonances flowing into her body. On a wooden platform, she removes her shoes so that the vibrations pass through her bare feet and up her legs. She says that music pours in through every part of her body. It tingles in the skin, her cheekbones and even in her hair.