Comment by misthop
1 day ago
I'm a musician, but don't "hear" music in my head. I have an extensive memory of lyrics, and can guess the next notes of a song, but I use my inner monologue to sing or hum it in my head, I don't hear it. I can recall the visuals of a movie scene similar to how I can tell you how my office is organized. It is a spatial memory of where things are and aligned with each other. I don't replay the scene in any sense of the word
To add to this as a follow aphant - I don't have a way to hear sounds unless they are in my voice. So everything from songs, to sirens are simply me speaking it via inner monologue.
> I use my inner monologue to sing or hum it in my head, I don't hear it
Wdym? I think that the inner monologue is "hearing it", with a varying degree of vividness between people, of course.
Some people hear orchestral swells when, say, reading a book that mentions them. I don't have that. I have an inner monologue that can sing. I forget the term but as I understand it there are people who don't have an inner monologue. I think many of those would still be able to have "sound" imagery
Some people hear it more like a recording.
Yeah, I can do that, but I think it is the same thing on a spectrum, just like the visual imagination.
3 replies →
I'm pretty sure this is the default. Who literally hears music when thinking of it.
I have music running in my head most of the time, at least in the background unless I’m concentrating deeply on something. I’m also a musician and the best way I can describe it is that the music I’m hearing in my head somehow comes out of my instrument.
I do. I can "play it back" in my head, with full music/lyrics/chords/etc.
I have aphantasia, and I think my experience with music is similar.
I can think about a song, think about the melody, lyrics, etc… but I don’t hear it. If I hear a couple notes that remind me of a song, I can go through the rest of the intro, get to where the lyrics start, and get to the chorus and remember the name of the song (if it doesn’t come to me instantly), but it’s nothing like playback. It’s more like my inner monologue doing a bad a cappella cover version.
I sometimes wonder if everyone is talking about the same thing, but using different language to describe it. Some being more vivid and metaphorical in their speech than others.
1 reply →
I do and just asked around among friends. Everyone did.
Most I think, especially among musicians, which makes the GP fascinating to me!
I can play the piano, saxaphone, and guitar, and I've never considered being able to think about music to be actually hearing it.
Can you literally hear music in a dream have you never had an auditorial hallucination?
Yes I've had auditorial hallucinations. It was clearly inside my head, I was not "hearing" it
It reminds me of a joke. It's better told in person but you get the idea:
A percussionist takes a day off and decides to see one of his orchestra's performances. The next day he's back and talking to one of the other percussionists. "How was it?" the other one asks.
"Unbelievable! You know the part where we go buhm buhm buhm buhm?"
"Yeah?"
"Well guess what the rest of the orchestra is doing?"
hums a spirited rendition of the William Tell Overture!