Day 5 - 154 -- Power of Music

Recuperating from the headache of yesterday took centre stage for me today. This means nothing much of note occurred beside washing my hair, feeding myself and folding laundry <smile>. The rain ended overnight but the wind continued through the day. The leaves have grown so more than branches danced in the air.

I found myself thinking about the roles music plays in our lives. Since the early humans, music has built community. Listening to live music provides shared experiences and feelings. Music has communicated feelings and information from the time of wandering minstrels who sang music and cultural stories -- very useful in a time when print literacy and access to printed word were low until printing presses took hold. Recorded music allowed people to hear music more broadly than in the home towns of musicians. This also brought groups together to hear the music and perhaps learn to reproduce it. Streaming technology brought many genres of music to individuals through ear buds. With blue tooth speakers groups of people can hear the streamed tunes. Ont the other side, people who meet to play and record music develop strong social bonds, too. With the many artists and genres at our fingertips, sharing electronically occurs quickly. Music-based social media sites build virtual communities that approximate the live music venue experience. I've mentioned before that a group of very close friends first met online in a music newsgroup years before the Web was developed. We still communicate daily over 20 years later. That tight-knit group came from love of music, particularly the shared experience of listening to music -- both at concerts and in online listening parties. Research shows that memories can be triggered by music. Also, music uses different memory pathways, so has been shown to bring people with dementia to a place where they can smile and sing along -- when they have difficulty communicating in other ways. Simply put, music is powerful.

A musical theatre singer made famous in the '60s as part of a pop band made an astute observation. Davy Jones said that music mingles souls. Those three words say so eloquently what I stumbled over above. A song that came to mind today notes that music can impact lives. The lyrics use first person singular when it would mean the same with a plural -- I vs. we. Enjoy!

I've Got the Music in Me -- Kiki Dee Band