Unraveling Music
“Without music, life would be a mistake” — Friedrich Nietzsche
What is it about listening to meaningless instruments and tonal patterns stitched together that make us feel so much? What goes on inside the vastly complicated and interconnected areas of our brain while making or listening to music? How has music come to evolve and affect the human condition? This is something so primitive, so fundamental, and so basic. It pervades everything known to us. In The Power of Music, Mannes states that music is something that stimulates more parts of our brains than any other human function, even more than a language. From the time you wake up to your alarm clock spluttering an obnoxiously loud tone, till the time your head hits the pillow, you’re surrounded by different sounds, pitches, tones, and noises. From the chirpy voice of your best-friend over the phone, to your favourite song blasting through the speakers. It would be quite horrendous to even imagine a world without music.
In 1994, a man called his wife through a telephone booth to inform her that he’d be home late due to the rains, when suddenly, a bolt of lightning jostled him forward. The next thing he knew, he woke up in his bed with his fingers tingling unknowingly, and a sudden urge to play the piano. This was an instrument he’d never before touched in his life; however, the impulse was irresistible. Not only that, he could play it quite brilliantly — various arrangements and all. How could this be? It makes one wonder, whether music is something more than just listening to a song and forgetting about it. Perhaps, it is an intricate, multifaceted experience, maybe even one that goes far beyond its auditory appeal.
In Musicophilia, the neurologist Oliver Sacks studied and narrated such intriguing and beguiling mysteries circling around music, and how deeply interwoven it is; not just in our lives but also inside our brains. He claims that it makes us survive things that could only be considered miraculous, but almost always have a rational explanation. Today, music has proven to help with chemotherapy, trauma, Alzheimer’s, Tourette’s syndrome, as well as emotional and behavioural problems. Further on, Sacks mentions a patient with Alzheimer’s, one who couldn’t recognize his own wife for years, but could play an instrument with every note on the correct scale. Those memories never faded. This is where the incorporation of muscle memory comes into play, wherein certain movements and actions simply become programmed into your brains. These memories aren’t essentially stored in your muscles, but rather in nerves that are attached to it. This requires you to no longer pause and think, since those memories stay with you and come to you instantaneously.
Music is structural, mathematical and architectural. You may not be aware of it, but your brain has to do a lot of computing to make sense of it. One of the most fascinating things you’ll ever hear is the fact that your brain doesn’t really belong to you. It is essentially dominated by Starbucks, McDonalds, and Apple and the relentless effort and money that goes behind making those commercials with unforgettable music that plays such a pivotal part in you making your choice. That coffee you drank yesterday or the burger you consumed a week ago are all results of carefully strategized commercials aimed at you to ensure that you remember and recognize the product, by its music. These act as “brainworms” — irritating tunes and jingles that get lodged in our heads over time. Imagine a stream gushing through an abandoned forest; no two currents would ever have the same force, the same timing, the same routes and destinations. That’s sort of what’s cooking inside your brain — with your neurons receiving close to 10,000 messages in mere milliseconds. Music, especially your favourite tunes, causes areas of your brain to light up like a tree on Christmas or like fireworks against a pitch-black sky when viewed through Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI). The amygdala, the part of the brain responsible for processing and triggering emotions, can make one control their fear, increase pleasure and prepare to fight, after listening to all sorts of music. Not only that but the hippocampus, the part that produces, retrieves and navigates us through emotional experiences and regulatory responses aids in the production of new neurons that lead to a distinctive improvement in memory, all with the help of music. This goes on to show us how the entire brain is put to work and exercised massively when it comes to producing or listening to music.
Today, we have reached such an advanced stage that experts inculcate and professionally use music in a systematic way to reach individual goals and aid treatment for several illnesses. Music is used to bring down the pain levels of a patient, offer them the freedom to express themselves without words and provide relaxation through singing, playing instruments, writing songs or listening to music.
This popular health psychology, formerly prevalent in Greek and Native American culture practice uses the physical, emotional, mental, aesthetic and spiritual facets of music to help people improve their overall health. Not only that, it was also prominently used in World War I and II, inculcating which marked a significant difference in the soldiers’ and nurses’ mood, spirits and outlook. Today, music therapists are often trained in more than just music- their expertise spanning across areas such as cognitive neuroscience, communication, psychological disorders and chronic illnesses. In addition to using music to express your feelings without words, you also explore changes in how you feel with music. If you express uncontrollable anger or stress, your music therapist might respond by having you listen to or create music with slow, soft, soothing tones, since heart rate and blood pressure readings respond according to changes in volume and tempo. Furthermore, it helps dealing with a myriad of physiological issues too, such as improved respiration and relaxed muscle tension. Our exquisite sensitivity to music can sometimes go quite wrong: Sacks, in his book, explores how catchy tunes can subject us to several hours of mental replay, and how a surprising number of people acquire unstoppable musical hallucinations that assault them day and night. However, more often than not, music goes brilliantly right. People with Broca’s aphasia can be taught to speak again through singing. Even people diagnosed with Williams syndrome — wherein they fail to develop their mental abilities beyond the capabilities of a toddler — have extraordinary musical facility, allowing them to play back any piece with seamless precision and clarity. Furthermore, imagine a patient with Alzheimer’s, one that has been unresponsive, put on headphones and their eyes lighting up, sometimes even starting to move and singing along. Then, there’s also those who could be termed as ‘amusic,’ for whom music is nothing but an arbitrary succession of more or less irritating sounds; something which, if removed or added to their lives, would make absolutely no difference. All of them, at varying degrees, are also unable to recognize or distinguish various pitches and reproduce them. However, this isn’t just trivial or random. This is a recognized condition — a disorder that results in this.
And similarly, it could be just as beneficial to people, especially students, in everyday life. Solely striving to make it a habit of starting a day with 20 minutes of music, or exercising to it playing in the background lights up the ‘reward centres’ in your brains leading to a much more happy and productive day. It boosts confidence, increases memory, makes us better at communication, lightens up our mood and holistically makes us feel better. Well, music even makes plants grow faster! And there’s no pressure to listen to purely classical music either, because turns out, whether it’s jazz, pop, or rap, your grey area prefers the same music as you do. However, it is true that certain types of music can make us move through a space faster or stay at a place longer. This is exactly why so much research has gone into comprehending and finding out what music works best for a particular mood. Hence, DJs are able to navigate through tracks and keep fluctuating the BPMs (beats per minute) that makes it impossible for the public to stop moving. Not only that, but singing in a group has proven to boost one’s mood immensely.
Regardless of how influential music is in an individual’s life, it exists everywhere and continues to alter moods and grow. The best thing to do is to acknowledge it, understand it, and use it to its utmost potential.
Editor - Shaon Bandopadhyay
Head Editor - Vibhavari Desai
