Music As a Mood Enchancer
Music Can Amplify Ambiance or It Can Be That Emotional Downer.
Music can amplify a mood whether it be happy or sad. It can bring a listener that one notch up to ecstasy or that much lower in the emotional totem pole. Many people are discovering that music is closely related to mood. Just picking the right song or score can be that emotional enchancer.
Soundtrack to Your Life
Soundtracks to movies have kept audiences at the edges of their seat or help them fall in love all over again. Scores like the Titanic are now synonymous to the movie. Horror movies are the same. It would be hard to imagine Jaws without the creepy orchestra playing in the background.
Soundtracks are so big in films and television that people often get confused when the soundtracks are missing. Shows like Big Brother who take out the music often times confuse the viewer. Audience members don’t know what to feel. They can sense the tension mounting from the silence through the screen, but without the direction that music helps with keeping viewers on track, viewers are, well, direction-less.
Speeding Up or Slowing Down
Music has helped keep the atmosphere since time memoriam. In his web article Scoring With Music, Mark McKergow notes how the heart beats at 80 per minute (bpm) while the body is at rest. The body, led by the heart, will speed up when listening to fast music and slow down when listening to lullabies.
He gives examples about people going to the gym listening to fast pop or techno music to speed them up as they pump iron. Or the music they can play at the postal office to keep employees working at a faster pace. Music at such venues as the grocery store can keep customers calmer and slow them down, encouraging shoppers to take their time to look at the shelves.
The Other Side of Music
But music hasn’t always been a pleasant experience. In some parts of the country it has been used as a form of torture. The repetition or even the sheer volume of music has been proven to be torturous.
Prisoners in Iraq have found out first hand. Repetitious playing of Metallica’s The Sandman and Sesame Street have deprived prisoners of any sleep. Sleep derived and perhaps with an annoying melody stuck in their heads, the prisoners have found this method of torture barbaric.
When the United States invaded Panama in 1989, Manuel Noriega, a former Panama general, was found holed up in an embassy. The United States immediately surrounded the embassy and blasted hard rock for several days until the general surrendered himself.
Music Throughout History
Whether it be tribal drums to prepare soldiers for battle, or the good old Barry White for romancing with the ladies, music has been the catalyst for many a good event.
Meet Mozart. He has been on many a playlist. Once performing for the Imperial courts of Vienna and Prague, Mozart is now holding private concerts for infants and toddlers. The claim is that the ‘Mozart Effect’ which research shows that popping in a tape of Mozart will increase IQ ranges by 8-9 percentages. Which is why expecting mothers are playing Mozart to their bellies hoping to bring into this world a newly born genius.
The Spirit of Music Today
While such acts as Britney Spears and The Jonas Brothers have monopolized the airwaves for the time being, good music will always prevail. The eclectic movement of music around the world goes to show that music is as much an evolving art form as any other form of aesthetic.
While Miley Cryus might be considered a form of torture to some, music is such a broad and wonderful art form that people readily forgive Miley for her singing. Listeners are free to switch the channel and listen to some Rilo Kiley instead or some Vampire Weekend--the choice is almost endless.
A Good Fix of Music
Whether it be a jumpy beat to a techno show or a country man cowboy singing his blues, music has been that catalyst to many a mood.
Music can be that mood enhancer or it can be that downer, which goes to show that by providing structure within what was once just noise and sound can be that powerful.
Musical Note
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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
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