The Visual Listening Guide
This chapter is a systematic examination of the Visual Listening Guide, a new type of printed graphic guide to facilitate active listening and understanding of orchestral works. Created by musicologist Hannah Chan-Hartley, the Visual Listening Guide is the first of its kind to appear in a concert program book, for use during a live performance. This chapter describes the development and creation of the Guide’s distinctive design. An analysis of its elements reveals how the Guide aims to show the structure of a symphonic work, acting like a map to it, indicating important sonic landmarks and other features. It also reviews the reception of the Visual Listening Guide following its first phase of use by concert-goers from 2015 to 2020, and considers the efficacy and potential of graphic guides to communicate about Western classical music to the broad public, helping organizations foster audience engagement and appreciation.