independent and unofficial
Prince fan community
Welcome! Sign up or enter username and password to remember me
Forum jump
Forums > General Discussion > Why do humans like music?
« Previous topic  Next topic »
Page 1 of 2 12>
  New topic   Printable     (Log in to 'subscribe' to this topic)
Author

Tweet     Share

Message
Thread started 06/26/19 10:24am

onlyforaminute

avatar

Why do humans like music?

After a couple of glasses of wine I started having weird thoughts. Why is there such thing as music? Some will probably say it comes from nature but I'm not convinced of that. Sure birds sing but that is their only way to communicate that's just basically them talkin we already talk. Every culture has music no matter how isolated they all have music and sing and dance and party. There's no reason for survival that humans have music. It's weird when you think about it.

Music has been with us as long as we can collectively remember. Musical instruments have been found dating back tens of thousands of years. Yet no one knows why we love music, or what function, if any, it serves.

Blood flow in the brain rises and falls to swells of music in areas associated with reward, emotion and arousal.


https://www.google.com/am...music.html
Time keeps on slipping into the future...


This moment is all there is...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #1 posted 06/26/19 11:09am

S2DG

avatar

I think this article brings up a few really good points. While I don't have a better explaination, I've been amazed by music and have my own observations as I've wondered and talked about this more than I care to admit.

I've always been amazed that music, like a sense of smell, can bring you back to a place and time in your mind immediately. The same goes with the music I'm currently listening to, it's tied to my history and my mix tapes of the summer of 2003 will take me right back. Then there's music that's "timeless" or stands the test of time. It connects no matter what age the person is or what memories an individual has of it.

The other thing is that your heart beat has a kind of swing to it that I think people feel on some level. I think this is some kind of connection with dancing but it's deeper than that to me. It's a connection to Rhythm that is thard to get the attraction. It just draws you in.

The emotional connection mentioned is the biggest factor IMO. Music has the power to make people happy, sad, angry and is another element that transcends cultures around the world. It's so beautiful to see and hear especially when a massive amount of people are all feeling it at the same time, so powerful on an emotional level. This was why Prince was so amazing and his live shows were magic.

As a musician, the state of flow that comes from playing with other people is something that many have tried to put into words but nothing can capture that feeling when you're all locked in as one. I've been addicted to that feeling since I was a child and playing in bands and orchestras. Religion understood this and made it a God based element, I'm not saying I don't agree but it's another factor that goes to how we feel and how music makes us feel.

Sorry for the rant but this topic is one I'm never done learning/talking about.

[Edited 6/26/19 11:11am]

  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #2 posted 06/26/19 1:08pm

KingBAD

avatar

the universe is harmonic

vibration and sound are internal connections...

i am KING BAD!!!
you are NOT...
evilking
STOP ME IF YOU HEARD THIS BEFORE...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #3 posted 06/27/19 7:27am

joppo

If you're dancing and other people around you are also dancing... And then you think about how weird it is that music plays and humans move their bodies in time to it... It's SO strange. Imagine what our pets must think. lol
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #4 posted 06/28/19 8:05am

onlyforaminute

avatar

joppo said:

If you're dancing and other people around you are also dancing... And then you think about how weird it is that music plays and humans move their bodies in time to it... It's SO strange. Imagine what our pets must think. lol



lol We probably look like we're having a seizure to them.
Time keeps on slipping into the future...


This moment is all there is...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #5 posted 06/28/19 11:31am

OldFriends4Sal
e

I think it does something, to us internally that we cannot control, but feels good, helps us express feeling when we don't know how, or refuse to

  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #6 posted 06/28/19 1:15pm

onlyforaminute

avatar

S2DG said:

I think this article brings up a few really good points. While I don't have a better explaination, I've been amazed by music and have my own observations as I've wondered and talked about this more than I care to admit.

I've always been amazed that music, like a sense of smell, can bring you back to a place and time in your mind immediately. The same goes with the music I'm currently listening to, it's tied to my history and my mix tapes of the summer of 2003 will take me right back. Then there's music that's "timeless" or stands the test of time. It connects no matter what age the person is or what memories an individual has of it.

The other thing is that your heart beat has a kind of swing to it that I think people feel on some level. I think this is some kind of connection with dancing but it's deeper than that to me. It's a connection to Rhythm that is thard to get the attraction. It just draws you in.

The emotional connection mentioned is the biggest factor IMO. Music has the power to make people happy, sad, angry and is another element that transcends cultures around the world. It's so beautiful to see and hear especially when a massive amount of people are all feeling it at the same time, so powerful on an emotional level. This was why Prince was so amazing and his live shows were magic.

As a musician, the state of flow that comes from playing with other people is something that many have tried to put into words but nothing can capture that feeling when you're all locked in as one. I've been addicted to that feeling since I was a child and playing in bands and orchestras. Religion understood this and made it a God based element, I'm not saying I don't agree but it's another factor that goes to how we feel and how music makes us feel.

Sorry for the rant but this topic is one I'm never done learning/talking about.

[Edited 6/26/19 11:11am]




I can see it.
Time keeps on slipping into the future...


This moment is all there is...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #7 posted 06/28/19 1:15pm

onlyforaminute

avatar

KingBAD said:

the universe is harmonic


vibration and sound are internal connections...





That, too.
Time keeps on slipping into the future...


This moment is all there is...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #8 posted 06/28/19 1:54pm

onlyforaminute

avatar

OldFriends4Sale said:



I think it does something, to us internally that we cannot control, but feels good, helps us express feeling when we don't know how, or refuse to




It definitely is essential to us.
Time keeps on slipping into the future...


This moment is all there is...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #9 posted 06/30/19 10:24am

2freaky4church
1

avatar

Nature plays its music. The ocean foam hitting the shore--that whoosh against the sand. Pure musical rush. Wind in the long grass. Has a cadence. The birds singing. The thunder raging. We learned about our inner music from watching nature. Since we are a part of nature, the guardians in fact.

All you others say Hell Yea!! woot!
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #10 posted 07/01/19 12:29pm

OldFriends4Sal
e

onlyforaminute said:

OldFriends4Sale said:

I think it does something, to us internally that we cannot control, but feels good, helps us express feeling when we don't know how, or refuse to

It definitely is essential to us.

it really is

I was also thinking about dance and movement in connection to music

Sometimes I'm able to disconnect at look at very 'animal or emotional' things and say with laughter "why do with do that? why do we make those sounds? etc"

But dancing is a very 'symbiotic' expression to music. I mean babies and toddlers automatically clap or dance to music.

  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #11 posted 07/03/19 1:49pm

kpowers

avatar

Humans are not the only ones that like music

Related image

  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #12 posted 07/04/19 11:33am

onlyforaminute

avatar

Ha!
Time keeps on slipping into the future...


This moment is all there is...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #13 posted 07/04/19 11:36am

onlyforaminute

avatar

OldFriends4Sale said:



onlyforaminute said:


OldFriends4Sale said:



I think it does something, to us internally that we cannot control, but feels good, helps us express feeling when we don't know how, or refuse to



It definitely is essential to us.


it really is



I was also thinking about dance and movement in connection to music



Sometimes I'm able to disconnect at look at very 'animal or emotional' things and say with laughter "why do with do that? why do we make those sounds? etc"


But dancing is a very 'symbiotic' expression to music. I mean babies and toddlers automatically clap or dance to music.




I'd say it's the one necessity we have that's completely rooted in curiosity and creativity. Basically pure.
Time keeps on slipping into the future...


This moment is all there is...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #14 posted 07/07/19 9:08am

KingBAD

avatar

Image may contain: 3 people, people smiling, text

the reason this is is because these are the ways you express the universe's harmonics....

i am KING BAD!!!
you are NOT...
evilking
STOP ME IF YOU HEARD THIS BEFORE...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #15 posted 07/07/19 11:18am

onlyforaminute

avatar

KingBAD said:

Image may contain: 3 people, people smiling, text


the reason this is is because these are the ways you express the universe's harmonics....



Are you saying we're one with the universe?
[Edited 7/7/19 11:18am]
Time keeps on slipping into the future...


This moment is all there is...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #16 posted 07/07/19 1:28pm

TheFman

GOOD music stimulates the brain with rewarding fun chemicals. Nothing more, nothing less.

The definition of 'good' in this context is music that makes your brain longing to solving a certain puzzle at the end of a pattern of triggering curiosity and mathematical expectancy.

Or something like that.

[Edited 7/7/19 13:29pm]

  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #17 posted 07/07/19 3:00pm

KingBAD

avatar

onlyforaminute said:

KingBAD said:

Image may contain: 3 people, people smiling, text

the reason this is is because these are the ways you express the universe's harmonics....

Are you saying we're one with the universe? [Edited 7/7/19 11:18am]

some folks only for a minnit...

lol lol lol lol lol

"what's it like inside your tamborine?"

i am KING BAD!!!
you are NOT...
evilking
STOP ME IF YOU HEARD THIS BEFORE...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #18 posted 07/07/19 5:04pm

onlyforaminute

avatar

KingBAD said:



onlyforaminute said:


KingBAD said:

Image may contain: 3 people, people smiling, text


the reason this is is because these are the ways you express the universe's harmonics....



Are you saying we're one with the universe? [Edited 7/7/19 11:18am]

some folks only for a minnit...


lol lol lol lol lol


"what's it like inside your tamborine?"



Well they got their moment at least.


haven't a clue never personally been there.
Time keeps on slipping into the future...


This moment is all there is...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #19 posted 07/08/19 9:57am

OldFriends4Sal
e

"I think there's just a really visceral, deep, emotional connection that can happen with music. My grandmother had Alzheimer's, and eventually died of it. But I remember, shortly before her death in 2006 — language was gone, she didn't know who we were, but if I sang her songs that she had sung to me as a child, songs that were from her childhood as well, she could sing with me. That really struck me. You know, I'm not by any means an expert on the neuroscience of music, but it taps into literally a different part of our brains and psyches. I was so struck by that with my grandma, and that was one way that we could still connect. Everything was fear and confusion for her at that point, but when we sang together she sort of came back to us.

Definitely, that song is inspired by her and that experience. She had a wealth of traditional British Isles tunes and songs that came out of the oral tradition. "Barely" is definitely influenced by the things that she taught me, the songs. And she was quite an amazing lady." - Aspasia Allison Russell

  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #20 posted 07/08/19 10:05am

OldFriends4Sal
e

Esperanza Spalding Knows Music Can Heal. Now She Wants to Prove It With Science.

https://www.thedailybeast...th-science

Larry Blumenfeld

Updated 06.09.19 3:07AM ET / Published 06.08.19 10:46PM ET

On the phone from her apartment in Brooklyn, Esperanza Spalding reflects on living in a pigsty.

It's not that her place is untidy. She means the beautiful studio that served as home for a month last summer, converted from the former pigsty of the Ranieri castle, a once-fortified circa 16th-century structure in Italy's Umbria region. There Spalding was inspired to create the series of incantations—each one meant "to activate a spell for each body part"—that form her latest release, 12 Little Spells.

When she arrived at that castle, Spalding had been dealing with stress through reiki, the Japanese spiritual process centered on energetic healing, and reading a lot of poetry. She'd been thinking about how trauma and healing are transmitted from body to mind and back, and how music figures into that process. Her "spells" began as small thing—"motivated more by intuition and trust than any real plan," she said—but it just kept growing.

Back in Brooklyn, she recorded the compositions with a musical cast that kept expanding. The album's title track opens like an overture; her core seven-piece band is augmented by a 10-piece "orchestra" including flutes and piccolos, trumpets, trombones and French horns, and a string section. In the Fall, she began releasing a dozen spells online, one at a time, weekly, with accompanying videos.

Later, she mounted a brief tour, singing barefoot in dramatic gowns on a circular platform before ever-shifting video projections—a dozen shows in 11 cities, no two exactly the same. This Spring, she began performing taut quartet versions of these songs.

With her album's physical release, Spalding added four new recently recorded spells, totaling 16 in all.

The accompanying booklet reads less like liner notes than an alternative-medicine guide. "Thang," which sways like good gospel and features some of Spalding's loveliest singing on record, is prescribed for "release of, or rejection of, tension in the hips... with sense of sinking into the mechanism of the hip sockets' natural range of motion while walking." "The Longing Deep Down," a complex piece that begins a cappella, is meant for the abdominal portal—"between your crotch and belly button," she explains. Spalding means her instructions as both literal and metaphorical. She seeks to stimulate personal healing while also addressing societal ills. In "Dancing the Animal," she sings: "Have you prayed to your phone today?"

Beginning with Junjo, released when she was 21, Spalding has emerged as a vocalist, bassist, and songwriter firmly grounded in but also treading ever so lightly on jazz tradition. She rose to mainstream stardom in 2011 by beating out Justin Bieber and Drake for the best-new-artist Grammy Award. She won three more Grammys in quick succession. She has collaborated with musical royalty and performed repeatedly at the Obama White House. (When I called, she was hard at work on the libretto for Iphigenia, a new opera slated for premiere next Fall by composer and saxophonist Wayne Shorter, a musician of towering achievement and her clearest and deepest mentor.)

If Spalding began her career wearing jazz like the loosest of garments, she has by now, at 34, mostly shaken off the trappings of any genre definition. Her songwriting bears traces of many influences: Joni Mitchell's story-like drama; Prince's ecstatic thrust; the scratchy surfaces and stuttering rhythms of Radiohead; the wily allure of Shorter's melodies. Yet her music sounds like no one else's. If there's a through-line from Spalding's start through 12 Little Spells, it's simply one of unrestrained ambition and a magnetism that radiates within any context.

  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #21 posted 07/09/19 12:28pm

onlyforaminute

avatar

So, what is music? This is difficult to answer, as everyone has their own idea. -
where do we draw the line between music and speech? You might think that rhythm, pattern and controlling pitch are important in music, but these things can also apply when someone recites a sonnet or speaks with heightened emotion. -

So, when did our ancestors begin making music? If we take singing, then controlling pitch is important. Scientists have studied the fossilized skulls and jaws of early apes, to see if they were able to vocalize and control pitch. About a million years ago, the common ancestor of Neanderthals and modern humans had the vocal anatomy to "sing" like us, but it's impossible to know if they did.

we know that music is old, and may have been with us from when humans first evolved.

What have survived are bone pipes. Some of the earliest ever found are made from swan and vulture wing bones and are between 39,000 and 43,000 years old. Other ancient instruments have been found in surprising places. For example, there is evidence that people struck stalactites or "rock gongs" in caves dating from 12,000 years ago, with the caves themselves acting as resonators for the sound.

, the major reason that music arose and persists may be that it brings people together. "Music leads to bonding,
Time keeps on slipping into the future...


This moment is all there is...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #22 posted 07/10/19 2:47am

Lovejunky

onlyforaminute said:

So, what is music? This is difficult to answer, as everyone has their own idea. - where do we draw the line between music and speech? You might think that rhythm, pattern and controlling pitch are important in music, but these things can also apply when someone recites a sonnet or speaks with heightened emotion. - So, when did our ancestors begin making music? If we take singing, then controlling pitch is important. Scientists have studied the fossilized skulls and jaws of early apes, to see if they were able to vocalize and control pitch. About a million years ago, the common ancestor of Neanderthals and modern humans had the vocal anatomy to "sing" like us, but it's impossible to know if they did. we know that music is old, and may have been with us from when humans first evolved. What have survived are bone pipes. Some of the earliest ever found are made from swan and vulture wing bones and are between 39,000 and 43,000 years old. Other ancient instruments have been found in surprising places. For example, there is evidence that people struck stalactites or "rock gongs" in caves dating from 12,000 years ago, with the caves themselves acting as resonators for the sound. , the major reason that music arose and persists may be that it brings people together. "Music leads to bonding,

Hard to define really..

but Singing comes naturally to Humans...

Babies coo..when they feel contented...

Maybe Early Cavewoman. noted that and started cooing back to her Baby one fine day

and then Cave Man joined in... razz

and before you Know it...they were rocking and rolling..razz

  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #23 posted 07/10/19 5:51am

OldFriends4Sal
e

onlyforaminute said:

So, what is music? This is difficult to answer, as everyone has their own idea. - where do we draw the line between music and speech? You might think that rhythm, pattern and controlling pitch are important in music, but these things can also apply when someone recites a sonnet or speaks with heightened emotion. - So, when did our ancestors begin making music? If we take singing, then controlling pitch is important. Scientists have studied the fossilized skulls and jaws of early apes, to see if they were able to vocalize and control pitch. About a million years ago, the common ancestor of Neanderthals and modern humans had the vocal anatomy to "sing" like us, but it's impossible to know if they did. we know that music is old, and may have been with us from when humans first evolved. What have survived are bone pipes. Some of the earliest ever found are made from swan and vulture wing bones and are between 39,000 and 43,000 years old. Other ancient instruments have been found in surprising places. For example, there is evidence that people struck stalactites or "rock gongs" in caves dating from 12,000 years ago, with the caves themselves acting as resonators for the sound. , the major reason that music arose and persists may be that it brings people together. "Music leads to bonding,

I would say music is basically rhythmic sounds conducted to soothe, rile up, focus etc individuals or people, whether with the mouth(like whistling) or using things found in nature(later developed into more specific instruments)

  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #24 posted 07/10/19 8:29am

deebee

avatar

Interesting topic. I guess one would have to suspect that, in evolutionary terms, our ability to make or simply be moved by music is a by-product of something more integral to survival that our brains evolved to do. I recall watching a documentary on the psychology of music years ago, as a music student, in which suggested that the limbic system in the brain was key to our ability to process music. That part of the brain developed relatively early in our evolution, and processes emotion. They talked about how it was connected to the parents' ability to discern what kind of cry the baby is making and react appropriately to that - i.e. explaining how we came to evolve the capacity to respond emotionally to different tonal sound.

There are quite a few books around these days on the psychology of music, though, and I'm sure it's been much more fully researched than I'm aware of. The great neurologist Oliver Sacks also wrote a book of case studies about music and the brain, showing how various different parts of the brain are engaged in making and processes music. There's a great bit in this BBC doc about that book where the presenter gets played some piddly muzak and his brain dutifully processes it in one region, then they play him a piece he loves, and immediately his whole brain is flooded with activity - suggesting it engages memory, emotion, cognition, all sorts of capacities.

Leonard Bernstein gave a famous series of televised lectures in the early 70s on 'The Unanswered Question' of why we have music. I haven't watched them all, but there's some interesting stuff in the first one about the fundamentals of sound, e.g. the harmonic series, and how they may account for why things like pentatonic scales are found in so many of the world's cultures. There's an amazing clip of Bobby McFerrin showing how we all seem to understand pentatonics, wherever we're from.

"Not everything that is faced can be changed; but nothing can be changed until it is faced." - James Baldwin
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #25 posted 07/10/19 10:53am

onlyforaminute

avatar

Coming soon. Stuff I ran into.

Call of the Wild

Do animals have rhythm? By Henkjan Honing, Ph.D.




Time keeps on slipping into the future...


This moment is all there is...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #26 posted 07/10/19 12:39pm

onlyforaminute

avatar

Yeah, but most animals have young to look after and need to distinguish the various cries of their offspring, especially trying to disguish theirs from a pack of others. But it seems we have the extra thing going on, that has nothing to do with survival. It is constructive, and has a lot of uses but for our overall survival as a species really doesn't look to be necessary. But it is necessary for our own emotional, spiritual, the whole inner person thingy.


ooops.



[Edited 7/10/19 12:40pm]

Time keeps on slipping into the future...


This moment is all there is...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #27 posted 07/13/19 1:02pm

domainator2010

I just got off kind of a "tech" (not consumer tech) chat channel where I was trying to be friendly with someone in the channel - just trying to be social. As soon as I did that, he stopped talking! As long as he was talking about wires or something, he was alright! It's just Frightening that there are people like this in the world! I'm so glad I've got YOU guys smile Now, everybody, I just NEED someone to tell me how HORRIFYING this is:

www.aiva.ai

It's just horrifying how technology has put engineers in charge of this world sad

[Edited 7/13/19 13:02pm]

  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #28 posted 07/13/19 1:21pm

onlyforaminute

avatar

Ha, you stay trying. Not on my thread. *post pic of Iyanla*

If folks were playing the star spangle banner 42,000 years ago Im packing it in.
https://youtu.be/3ZlB9KWpbJ0
Time keeps on slipping into the future...


This moment is all there is...
  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Reply #29 posted 07/13/19 6:55pm

S2DG

avatar

deebee said:

Interesting topic. I guess one would have to suspect that, in evolutionary terms, our ability to make or simply be moved by music is a by-product of something more integral to survival that our brains evolved to do. I recall watching a documentary on the psychology of music years ago, as a music student, in which suggested that the limbic system in the brain was key to our ability to process music. That part of the brain developed relatively early in our evolution, and processes emotion. They talked about how it was connected to the parents' ability to discern what kind of cry the baby is making and react appropriately to that - i.e. explaining how we came to evolve the capacity to respond emotionally to different tonal sound.

There are quite a few books around these days on the psychology of music, though, and I'm sure it's been much more fully researched than I'm aware of. The great neurologist Oliver Sacks also wrote a book of case studies about music and the brain, showing how various different parts of the brain are engaged in making and processes music. There's a great bit in this BBC doc about that book where the presenter gets played some piddly muzak and his brain dutifully processes it in one region, then they play him a piece he loves, and immediately his whole brain is flooded with activity - suggesting it engages memory, emotion, cognition, all sorts of capacities.

Leonard Bernstein gave a famous series of televised lectures in the early 70s on 'The Unanswered Question' of why we have music. I haven't watched them all, but there's some interesting stuff in the first one about the fundamentals of sound, e.g. the harmonic series, and how they may account for why things like pentatonic scales are found in so many of the world's cultures. There's an amazing clip of Bobby McFerrin showing how we all seem to understand pentatonics, wherever we're from.


I've seen the Bobby McFerrin clip more than once but these others are new to me. Thanks for these links!

[EDIT] Just went down the wormhole with the late, great, Oliver Sacks because of this thread. Explained so many things I've wondered about music, thanks again!

[Edited 7/13/19 22:13pm]

  - E-mail - orgNote - Report post to moderator
Page 1 of 2 12>
  New topic   Printable     (Log in to 'subscribe' to this topic)
« Previous topic  Next topic »
Forums > General Discussion > Why do humans like music?