Mirror Magazine

Mirror Magazine

Thank you for the music
By Priyanwada Ranawaka
Children fall asleep listening to a lullaby. Hymns pacify communities. Beats make you move. Michael Jackson can bring an audience to its feet. Enigma arouses mystery. Strings play with your emotions. Music heightens effect in movies. A world without music is unimaginable…

Music can have a very powerful influence on our emotions, moods and behaviour, a fact that has been recognised through the ages. Historically, it has been used for such varied purposes from bolstering courage before battles to singing babies to sleep to enhancing the courtship process and accompanying rites of passage through life. It has been used to incite rebellion and can challenge the status quo. There is practically no other human cultural activity that is so pervasive, which has the power to reach into, shape and often control so much of human behaviour with invisible vibrations.

Stimulating
“Music is considered to be a right-brain-stimulant, which means it can sharpen the right brain abilities,” says psychologist Dr. Weerasekara. According to him, effect of sound on the brain and the mind is a vast area of which music is a vital part. “The fact that music affects our behaviour is the foundation of music therapy, a field in which music is applied as a tool to modify aberrant behaviour,” he says.

Movies and television shows use music as it can induce a sense of anticipation in the viewer and affect their emotions. Says film editor Ranjith Silva, “For example, if a camera focuses on a dark path with woods on either side, the presence of ‘spooky’ music heightens our expectations that someone is going to jump from behind a tree brandishing a knife. We become nervous and hold on to our seats.” Yes, the effect would be definitely less without the music!

Establishing the relationship between listening to particular types of music and self-determined behaviour is extremely difficult. However, there is some evidence of an association between young people’s listening habits and aspects of their lifestyle. “I usually go for the ‘in’ thing which I get to know about through my friends. When it comes to music, my tastes vary from time to time. I experiment with different flavours,” says 16-year-old Awanthika. One day she’s a “rock fanatic” and the next an “Eminem follower.”

“I believe music imitates life; rap and heavy metal music merely reflects the alienation, powerlessness and aggressiveness prevalent among some groups of adolescents,” says Mrs. Gunetilake, a music teacher and a mother of three teenage children. “When role models are unavailable, children seek to replace them, and music, and the people who play or sing it fill these gaps providing them with a sense of identity, peer acceptance and feelings of power,” she says.

Destructive
Criticism of rock and rap music and its purported effects has been documented over the years and it has been argued whether certain types of music can inculcate anti-social or self-destructive behaviour. As music plays an important part in teenagers’ lives, there is a continuing concern amongst older generations about its possible negative effects on behaviour.

I feel it’s all in the listeners’ manner of decoding,” says Shyamin, a 19-year-old ‘Rockaholic’. According to him, rock music and lyrics may offer support to those who are already pre-disposed to violence or holding such views.

In response to the claim that negative moods and ideas are generated through rock music, Stigmata rocker Suresh de Silva says, “rock music is just like other genres of music,” stressing that violence-related incidents have not taken place during their concerts. “I know that most people take comfort in listening to rock songs that have lyrics describing situations similar to what they’re going through. Rock music is not all about negativity, there is certainly the element of hope,” says Suresh. “We don’t wish to depress the listener. Rock music is a mode of escapism.”

“If an emotional impact cannot be created on the listener, it’s a complete failure on the part of the artist, as a messenger,” says Suresh. Talking of himself as a listener, he says that his favourite bands, although their lyrics are on various themes relating to criticism of governments, social structures or religion, “can only provoke thoughts, not so much a behaviour.” “At the same time,” he says, “I prefer listening to bands like Iron Maiden that sing about the ancient Greeks.”

“There are complex interactions between the individual, his or her social personal circumstances and the effects of music,” says Suresh. One’s particular type of music can create a state of arousal, which can transfer to subsequent situations and influence the listener to aggressive behaviour. But none of these explanations alone are sufficient to explain the relationship between music and behaviour in every case.

Driving moods
What we know about the influence of music is that it can influence our moods and some aspects of our behaviour in ways that may be outside our consciousness. How is this possible? “Music is rejuvenating,” says Pravin (24). Describing how he personally finds music to be better than a body massage at the end of a tiring day, he says that his behaviour would change according to what he listens to. “When I listen to a catchy tune with a fast beat while driving, I unconsciously speed up, and then slow down the moment the DJ starts to speak,” he says.

Music can also help people remember. “At school children are made to sing rhymes to a tune, which helps them to memorize a given task,” says Mrs. Janaki Kulasena, a Grade one teacher.

“Music in offices, if properly structured, can have a positive effect on worker efficiency,” reveals the CEO of a renowned establishment. An executive officer of a famous shopping mall also echoes this idea, adding that familiar music can induce good moods, and that playing good music can have a dramatic effect on customers. An employee at a restaurant says, “A fast tempo is more desirable for us as people then tend to eat faster, thus allowing greater table turn over and higher sales.”

Different beats
On the topic of lyrics, composer Santhush Weeraman of B&S says, “It is not pre-decided whether you are going to write music for a sad song or a happy song. It just comes naturally though you have in your mind a few keywords from the lyrics. You later add a beat and the flavour accordingly. He also revealed that music composers generally believe that minor scales go more with dark and sad themes, while major scales are much more appropriate for what he called “happy music”.

“But when you get on stage, it’s a different case,” he explains. “There, you are not a composer, but a performing artiste. Your mission is to get the audience as excited as possible so everything is done on a different scale. He says it gives a great feeling to see the audience reacting to their music.

Music can change people’s lives in unimaginable ways. It can give strength to people and can change their attitude towards life. So be it pop, rock, hip-hop, rap jazz, classical or techno, to live life more meaningfully, add music to your life!

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