Take advantage of free musical performances in the summer!

I've been enjoying a number of free (or almost free) concerts this summer. Our town, Newmarket, Ontario, and the neighbouring towns all have musical evenings in parks, and Jazz Festivals, and even musical entertainment at weekly farmers markets.

I'm recommending to musicians and to music-lovers to take advantage of these concerts. Musicians will get fans this way. I've bought a CD, and "friended" and "liked" and "retweeted" about a number of the acts that I enjoyed. Listeners will expand their musical taste to include genres they might not have considered.

These performances have given me and my children excellent experiences of seeing and hearing all kinds of live music with very little effort and no stress- short travel time, no dress-up time, no worries about being late or whether we can sit still or hold in our coughs or comments...

We've got lawn chairs and blankets ready to go in the family minivan at all times, just like the summers of soccer when my girls were little.

We love music and listen to the radio and our playlists on iTunes, watch YouTube videos and posts on other social networking sites, and we make music at home on our keyboard, guitar, ukulele and recorders. We sing and dance at home and when shopping. Music is a big part of our lives, and watching other musicians perform is special. The live experience leaves a greater impression than just hearing a song on the radio.

Live music, not a recording of a live concert, is special. When you're singing along, clapping and waving your hands, and applauding for a particularly good guitar solo, you make real lasting connections to the music and the artists. Often, the artists stick around to shake hands and share hugs with fans. And, they sell CD's and merchandise to provide physical souvenirs of these wonderful experiences.

I've said it before about classical music, in this post, that performers need to go out into the public, in flash mobs or free concerts, so that people can be introduced in a very positive way to music that they feel cautious about, or have preconceived negative feelings about. And, I'd like to extend that to jazz, funk, metal, any kind of music. Every kind of music takes some getting used to. Musicians have to be willing to go out there to summer music festivals and farmers markets to get their sound out there into the public ear.

In this article by Graeme McMillan on the Time website, See, Hear: Rediscovering the Pleasures of Live Music, the author argues that the communal experience of live music might be the best way to experience music. He says:

I feel like I’ve slowly come to understand how important the live music experience can be to bring us out of ourselves in terms of taste and expectation, and introduce us to something new, wrapped up in the more familiar guise of just going to a show. 

Passionate Performers: Mumford and Sons

If you haven't seen these guys perform, do it now! They're awesome! 

Here's a link to one of their YouTube videos, Little Lion Man . (Excuse the 4-letter word. I'm no fan of expletives but, you'll see.) Here's another with no colourful language, I Will Wait, live with the massive audience appreciating their efforts.

We have both of their albums in our house, on our electronic devices and on several playlists. The CD's sit ready to play in the kitchen where morning wake-up music is often Mumford and Sons. 

Wake up. Wiggle, dance, and play air banjo! Stomp your feet, sing along and feel uplifted. 

Once you've seen a video, you can always imagine them playing for you and you'll feel even better.

For a hot day: Jazz it up!

Jazz is cool.

When it's steamy outside, turn up the ceiling fans and play some Etta James or Ella Fitzgerald.

Here's a link to Ella singing Too Darn Hot.

Here's a link to Etta singing Take Me to the River

Play some air guitar and slide trombone. Groove a bit. You're going to feel cool.

Reading list: Music and the intersection of the brain and the soul

Oh wow! I just found a perfect reading list for myself! (Just in time for summer reading, yay!)

A Facebook post directed me to a Brain Pickings post called,
"7 Essential Books on Music, Emotion, and the Brain" by Maria Popova.

Isn't that just perfect!

Here's what the author says:

But perhaps even more fascinating than the subject of how music works is the question of why it makes us feel the way it does. Today, we try to answer it with seven essential books that bridge music, emotion and cognition, peeling away at that tender intersection of where your brain ends and your soul begins.


Here's the list:

1. Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain, Revised and Expanded Edition by Oliver Sacks
2. This Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession by Daniel J. Levitin
3. Music, Language, and the Brain by Aniruddh D. Patel 
4. The Rest Is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century by Alex Ross
5. Music, The Brain, And Ecstasy: How Music Captures Our Imagination by Robert Jourdain
6. The Tao of Music: Sound Psychology - Using Music to Change Your Life by John M. Ortiz
7. Music and the Mind by Anthony Storr

I love that: "that tender intersection of where your brain ends and your soul begins." That's where music works its magic. 

Silly Fun: Veggie Tales' Rock Monster

The original song, Rock Lobster, by the B52's was fun and silly enough, but it gets even sillier when it's the Pirates Who Don't Do Anything performing their version of it.
In case you've never heard of Veggie Tales and the PWDDA, look them up. They're awesome. Really. The vegetables who are pirates are adorable.
Groove with Rock Monster. Dance with the monster! You'll feel great. Really!

Music Makes You Smarter: Graphic from OnlineCollege.org

Leap off the Music Springboard: Yesterday Once More

Music itself triggers emotional responses, but there's much more involved.

Sometimes its seems that everyone has the same emotional response to a piece of music, but then sometimes it's just you. Why? Because, you can't help but connect that melody to a memory.

You think a song is romantic because you danced a memorable slow dance to it in High School.
You think organ music is oppressive because you hated church when you were young.
You love that advertising jingle because your daughter danced to it when she could barely walk.
That heavy metal song makes you wistful, because it makes your moody teenage son dance.

The Carpenters song, Yesterday Once More was about listening to old songs and remembering the past.

When you're taking a walk down memory lane, it helps to have a soundtrack. Playing old songs will spark old memories. When you feel like you need a memory boost, make a playlist of old songs and leap off the music springboard into the past. Beware: those memories will come with all the emotions surrounding them too.

Every sha-la-la-la
Every wo-o-wo-o
Still shines
Every shing-a-ling-a-ling
That they're startin' to sing's
So fine.

All my best memories
Come back clearly to me
Some can even make me cry.

Just like before
It's yesterday once more.

Young, Cool and Worldly in Toronto

A song can make you feel a certain way, or it can trigger a memory that can make you feel certain feelings.
This song makes me feel happy and cool, and I remember shopping at a cool shop selling exotic stuff of some kind upstairs in the Eaton Centre in Toronto, hearing this song and staying to listen to several songs from the album, and then asking the salesperson for the name of the artist so I could buy the album. It was Ottmar Liebert and Luna Negra. I think I went directly to the record store and bought the cassette. (My daughters will laugh here, because I still call the place where you can buy music " the record store" and they think it's hilarious. They'll probably think it's equally ridiculous that I bought a tape at the record store.)
For some reason, that made me feel grown up and cool and worldly. This music was a flamenco-type fusion-ish new thing, and this Ottmar guy was so wonderfully exotic: American, he was born in Germany to a German-Chinese father and Hungarian mother, and into Spanish guitar. The music is relaxing and pleasant to listen to, great for dinner accompaniment, and also makes me want to dance. I bought the second album too, on tape.

Raffi: Cool It! Happy Earth Day!

Raffi is best known for giving the world Bananaphone and other cute and gentle children's songs, but he's also a really good guy who's using his talent and fame to promote individual and community action on a number of global themes. His website is called : Centre for Child Honouring! I love that.

In honour of Earth Day, I'm posting Raffi's cool new song, Cool It!

Cool It: The Global Cooling Song is a positive and fun song with a catchy chorus that you'll want to sing along with. And, hopefully you'll also be inspired to respond to his plea:


do it for the children, do it for yourself
everybody’s needed, everyone can help

we can do it, turn this world around, cool it cool it down
cool it, cool it, cool this planet down, cool it cool it down

Powerful emotional moment singing in NZ Parliament for equal marriage

This is awesome! Such a powerful, moving moment in history! The power was there, a great thing had been done, but the song brought out the full meaning and emotional power of it and underscored it like only music can. The spontaneous singing was stunning!

On April 17, 2013 New Zealand's Parliament voted in favour of equal marriage. After the vote was announced, people on the floor congratulated themselves and each other with applause and hugs and kisses and flowers. That alone was endearing. Parliament. Then, the people in the public gallery above broke out in song!!! The began to sing a Maori love song, such a beautiful thing to do, and such a haunting song that it made me cry. There will never be a more beautiful version of that song, Pokarekare Ana.

Perfect Kids' Song: Bananaphone

You've got to love Raffi. He's got great songs and he's a good guy. And, this is a perfect super-duper kids' song that you want to sing along with, and it makes you feel silly and goofy, just like a kids' song should.
Boop-a doop-a-doop! Ring-ring, ring-ring, ring-ring-ring, Bananaphone!

It's a-peeling!

He's committed to honouring children, and Raffi's music certainly speaks to the child in me.

Freaky Sunday School Video: Fun song, but do kids like it?

I'm not sure what to think about this Hillsong Kids song and video. I laughed. It was funny. And, I guess I understand what they're trying to say with Jesus being a bigger superhero than all the popular kids' heroes. But, I'm not really sure how I feel about it and how it makes me feel.

Boost your weight loss, immunity and happiness with music! 

By Natasha Turner, ND | Chatelaine

Here's another article about the benefits of music, this one from Chatelaine written by naturopathic doctor Natasha Turner. She talks about how music eases anxiety, decreases blood pressure, heart rate and breathing rate, reduces cortisol and increases endorphins. Music helps to keep you motivated in an exercise program and helps you to lose weight. It's good that she mentions that choice of music is important, not only tempo but your perception of how joyful or stressful it is. She offers some tips which I like:

1. Listen to music during your workouts. Pick up beat tempos to help you work harder and maximize your fitness results.

2. Play soothing music in your car to reduce tension, anxiety or pain. Combine chilled-out music with 15 minutes of down time at the end of your day. You will be amazed at how well this reduces cortisol levels - even in the midst of traffic.

3. Listen to music for an added mood and pain reducing boost when you go out in the morning for your daily dose of sunshine.

Vivaldi's Spring from the 4 Seasons: Glory, Glorious

Vivaldi's Spring

Happy Easter!
Wishing you new beginnings whenever you need them.

Another sobbing-in-public song for Good Friday

This sobbing-in-public story happened at church. It was a Confirmation Sunday, when young people become adult members of the church.

A young woman sang this song and I cried, and gasped and sobbed. It was so beautiful, that even thinking about it makes my eyes fill with tears.

Mary Did You Know is often sung at Christmas time, but I think Easter is more appropriate. And, it was very appropriate at that ceremony that celebrates the beginning of adulthood, the end of childhood.

On that Sunday, I knew all of the Confirmands. I had taught them Sunday School. I cried because they looked so grown-up in their special clothes and in their special roles on their celebration day. Who knows what they will be, what wonderful things they will do?

Of course, I cried for my babies. When I kissed their baby faces, I was kissing the face of God. When I see their beautiful almost-grown-up faces, I still see God. Who knows what they will be, what wonderful things they will do?

Benefits of Tequila: Removes shyness, enhances voice!

Yup! Listen to Tequila.

They always say alcohol is bad for singers, but there are some benefits.
It's certainly not a good idea to get drunk and then try to perform. We've seen a few rock stars try that and it's not pretty. But, one regular drink can be just the thing to reduce your inhibitions, and help you to sing out with feeling.
I used to tell my adult ESL students that a shot of something strong before class would probably help them to  loosen up and speak English better. When I was studying Linguistics at York University, I read about a study that measured the relationship between alcohol consumption and learning a language. They gave people different amounts of alcohol and then measured their performance in a second language, and the optimal amount was 1 1/2 ounces, an average shot.

Here's a link to an article about drinking and learning a new language.
I bet that would work for singing.

15 Studied Effects of Classical Music: It's really good for you!

This illustration is from the article 15 Studied Effects of Classical Music on Your Brain | Online PhD Programs which you can read by clicking on that link. (update: that link died and I can't find that article again! Sorry. And, now I don't have a way to acknowledge the creator of that image.) It's a great visual representation of what goes on when you listen or perform classical music, or any music, really. The article goes on to show how classical music is beneficial to our health and well-being in many ways, and gives scientific support. I wish that there were more studies done with different kinds of music. People don't all respond to music the same way, and different music can have similar benefits.

Happy St. Patrick's Day- Happy Irish Music in a bar

Now, this is music. Love the bar, the band, the dancing, clapping, hooting, everything. It's fun and happy and you just want to join in!

Gregorian Chant: Tranquility

According to Wikipedia, if you want to calm down, "conventional wisdom" prescribes Gregorian Chants:

In 2008, the Cistercian Monks of Austrian Heiligenkreuz Abbey released the CD Chant – Music for Paradise, which became the best-selling album of the Austrian pop charts and peaked #7 of the UK charts. In the US, the album was released under the title Chant – Music for the Soul and peaked at #1 on the Billboard classical charts.

It became conventional wisdom that listening to Gregorian chant increased the production of alpha waves in the brain, reinforcing the popular reputation of Gregorian chant as tranquilizing music.

When you follow the link to Alpha Waves, Wikipedia says this: 

Zen-trained meditation masters produce noticeably more alpha waves during meditation. This fact has led to a popular trend of biofeedback training programs for everyday stress relief.

So, when we listen to Gregorian Chants, we get more alpha waves and when we have more alpha waves we can be as calm as a Zen master meditating.  

Here is a link to a  video of a chant from the Cistercian Abbey Stift Heiligenkreuz in the Vienna Woods and there's a link to the Abby's website if you're interested in learning more.

The Gregorian Chants are not the only chants that are reputed to help us relax. If you search on YouTube, you can find all kinds of other chanting and they're all supposed to help us meditate, relax and become peaceful. 

Here is a video of Tibetan chanting:

Chanting is really just singing together. When people chant at a protest or at a soccer match or hockey game, they're definitely not trying to calm everyone down. Singing together is powerful for the singers and for those listening. I know that from singing in a choir and at church and at sports events.

The Gregorian chants and the Tibetan chants that people listen to when they want to relax are spiritual and have their own special power. 

Word Power: Imagine the power of music

This picture-quote that I saw posted on Facebook expresses the power of words, and advises us to choose our words carefully. 

It makes me think of all the people who are out there texting and posting every word that comes to mind, without thinking of the power of their words. It's cool that we are reading and writing more and more to express ourselves to communicate electronically, but the result is that a lot of stuff that would have gone unrecorded, lost to the wind as soon as it's out of the mouth, now has the potential to be kept and shared forever. The four-letter word that slipped out, the hateful words, angry words, unformed thoughts, careless things are out there reflecting on you and affecting others. That's the messy side of this power of words thing.

The awesome side of this is how it relates to music. Music has special powers. It can create smiles or frowns and generate laughs and tears. A melody can do that. So can the the lyrics. Add them together and include a powerful performance by a bunch of musicians, and the power increases exponentially!

When you are making music, be aware of the power you are wielding.

Think of the power of music when you choose what to listen to. I think it should be like choosing what you eat. Choose the things that will make you healthier most of the time and have some fun or scary or simply awful stuff too in moderation. If you're a parent, consider what you're feeding your children, what they're being exposed to, and how it will affect their health. 

Choose your music carefully.

Joy: the music and the sharing of the music: Som Sabadell flashmob

Balance is everything. I've been listening to too much sad music.

It's good to have lots of sad songs to help us to deal with our own sadness, and to help us appreciate our relative gladness. We love sad songs, but we also look to music to lift our spirits and to keep our spirits up. So, this is about Joy. The deep sadness of the last couple of posts deserves to be balanced out, not just with happiness, but with great joy.

What better piece of music to demonstrate joy than Beethoven's Ode to Joy? And, what better vehicle than this video of the famous flash mob created by Banco Sabadell to celebrate their 130th anniversary!

This excellent flash mob features over 100 people in the Vallès Symphony Orchestra and the choirs of Lieder and Friends of l’Opera and the Choral Belles Arts.

BTW I get impatient with people who believe flash mobs should be done spontaneously, and get all bent out of shape when they're planned. How do they think anyone does it without planning and rehearsing? And, flash mobs aren't allowed to have a commercial connection because music is supposed to be free, right? Have they tried to buy a cello or a bassoon? What about rehearsal space? Only ice-time is expensive? Grr.

The video shows that we experience music with our eyes and our mouths and our whole bodies, using all of our senses and all of our previous experiences to appreciate the performance. You can see people with cameras, people pushing forward to see better, and a little girl climbing a lamp post so she can see better. Music isn't just about listening. You see the little girl up a lamp post later conducting. I love it! People are singing along, moving to the music. I'm sure that in their imaginations, they're playing with the musicians, upbowing and downbowing, moving the trombone slide in and out, and conducting like only the children dare to do. This is just what David Byrne was taking about in his book "How Music Works" when he wrote about mirror neurons and music!

We need more of this! We need the orchestras and bands to become buskers, taking their music to the street, taking their music to the people. If we can experience live music made by people that look just like us, then we'll appreciate it more, not less. Even just the video of this performance has affected millions of people!

Can you imagine that there are people who only experience orchestral music through recordings or sitting still in a concert hall dressed in their best and probably least comfortable clothes?

People should be given opportunities to make music and get up close to musicians more often. Musicians must share the joy.

When I was young, band or orchestra were compulsory at least for 2 years. I played clarinet in band and envied my friends who played string instruments in orchestra. Yes, there were 2 full-time music teachers. We never got together for a big orchestral experience. Too bad. In high school, music was optional and there was only band. So, in the end I was lucky because I was able to continue playing my instrument until the end of high school, Grade 13 at the time.

My children are fortunate to have gone to a school where they had an excellent music teacher and lots of band instruments. The students' concerts were awesome, and made me cry because I remember the joy of playing in a band, making great big music with my friends. Too many schools have no band instruments, no full-time music teachers, not enough time dedicated to music. That's sad!

I am also fortunate to live in Newmarket where we have a Community Choir. I get so much joy from participating in the choir! And, I get an even greater joy from sharing the joy of music in performances in the community.

Public funding for music is sooooo important. I would go so far as to suggest that putting music back in schools, giving children and their families a few years of experience making music and playing in an orchestra, will increase peace and decrease crime. In addition, the number of well-paid musicians with stable careers will help to increase the value of music.

Fado: Portuguese Sad Music

Fado is the Portuguese folk music that sounds super sad, mournful, dramatic and tragic. It's a really old genre, but there are modern Fadistas, like Mariza:

This Fado song is called Primavera. (Note that I've posted a song called Maledetta Primavera) Check out the words! So sad! Why is it so good to hear such sad music sometimes? It is good, isn't it? 

It kind of makes the blues sound happy. I'll be on the lookout for some really sad blues next. Fado can't seriously beat the blues at being blue, can it?

Gloomy Sunday: Compelling Despair

This has to be here, a song known for being so sad that it inspires suicide. It's even stronger because of the video with pictures of the tragic Marilyn Monroe with the song playing.

I love that people believe that music is so strong that it can lead you to great acts of violence. It's been said of heavy metal music and rap music.

Gloomy Sunday is so sad that it is said to have pushed people over the edge several times. I wonder if Fado has been blamed for any deaths?

Originally called "The End of the World", it was written in Hungary in 1932 by Rezső Seress. Below is a video of an English group called Budapest Cafe Orchestra performing it. They've got something very cool going on. The gypsy violin sound is probably more heart-wrenching than pictures of Marilyn. 

On Wikipedia, it says:

Seress initially had difficulty finding a publisher, mainly due to the unusually melancholy nature of the song. One potential publisher stated:

"It is not that the song is sad, there is a sort of terrible compelling despair about it. I don't think it would do anyone any good to hear a song like that."

Empathetic neurons-they make it work

I'm going to quote David Byrne again. I just finished reading his book, "How Music Works." Great book. He talks about a study by neurologists that found that " visual and auditory clues trigger empathetic neurons". When we see someone smile, our facial muscle neurons fire and so do our happy neurons. It's an essential part of communication.

I learned about that when I studied Linguistics too. Its part of why it's easier to hear when we're wearing our glasses, and harder to communicate by telephone. Language isn't just sounds put together to make words. We get information about what is being said from watching faces. We spend a lot of time looking at people's mouths instead of looking them in the eye when they're talking.

Here's the quote about empathetic neurons and music:

"These emotional connections might help explain why music has such a profound effect on our psychological well-being. We can use music (or, for better or worse others can use it) to regulate our emotions. We can pump ourselves (or others) up or calm others (or ourselves) down."

This also explains why we play air guitar, pretend to play the piano or trumpet, or conduct when we hear some music. It's a mirroring thing.

There's more, and I encourage you to check out the book. It's full of interesting ideas about how and why people create the kinds of music they do, and how it gets distributed too. There's a fair bit of biographical stuff as well.

In the meantime, let's listen for music that pumps us up and calms us down. Maybe you'll want to make a couple new playlists for yourself. Maybe you've already got a calming music playlist?

O Fortuna - Carmina Burana - Epic indignation

This is such a cool piece of music! I looked at a number of videos on YouTube and there are some really interesting ones. There's a Star Wars one and horror ones, Andre Rieu, and lots of choirs. I like this one because you have the words to sing along with and a translation, and the video is good. Knights are good. I imagine some kind of violent religious rite, a passionate sacrifice, when I hear this, so it works for me.
Heavy metal lovers should like this. O Fortuna has the same elements of anger, indignation, and violence that a lot of metal pulses with.

Shelter in a Storm: love

This is another Joan Armatrading song. Moody, and sweet too. Makes me feel like my heart can open up some more and love more deeply. And, I have a shelter in a storm. He makes me feel safe when there's thunder and loves me with the grace and willingness of a Willow.

Show Some Emotion

Light up if you're feelin' happy, but if it's bad then let those tears roll down.
This is fun to sing along with.
Some good funky music!
Funny, it talks about letting the bad feelings out, but it just makes me feel good :)

Show Some Emotion by Joan Armatrading (link to a live recording)

Making music to deal with troubles: instruments of peace?

This Facebook post by "Her Will: community page about meta-physics" is interesting because of the use of that picture to illustrate the quote. 

How does a girl playing the piano illustrate "Worrying doesn't solve tomorrow's trouble; it just takes away today's peace"? 

Well, the hot, moody colours of the room and the burst of bright positive stuff coming out of the piano as well as the little fairy seated beside the girl are significant. It looks like the piano is creating the positive stuff. The postures of the girl and the fairy are not positive, so the source of the happiness is within the instrument. Could the piano be creating the peace for the girl? 

Certainly, making music can help us to work through feelings we have. Just as expressing ourselves in a heart-to-heart with good friend can help to define and dissipate feelings, so can creating or interpreting a piece of music provide an outlet for our thoughts and emotions to illuminate them and then set them free.

The music we create can give us and others peace, and when we are at peace with our thoughts and emotions we spread that peace around. 

Happy Valentine's Day!

Danza Kuduro: Forget your troubles and dance

Danza Kuduro

When I was young- in my 20s- I danced a lot. Practically every weekend. It was amazing. No matter how stressed I was about my university studies, parents, siblings, work, life, I could forget about it all and be blissful for a few hours on Saturday night. My body worked hard, so I felt strong (and I was) and my heart was light and happy. Probably the best weekly therapy.

Ai Se Eu Te Pego; Young and Fun

Simple fun. You don't have to understand the lyrics, just let the fun play through you. It's a flirty fun, sexy but innocent and sweet too, leaving lots to the imagination. All those girls! That is one happy boy singing there!
I like this live recording. The interplay between the singer and the audience is great.
This is a good song for summertime or a beach vacation, eh?

Chariots of Fire - honour, dignity

Here's another inspiring piece of music. 

Honour, dignity, privilege, and excellence in a song: Chariots of Fire.
This gives you the lift that being good at something gives you. Pride?

El Cid - Overture / Prelude: Valiant

How does valiant sound? Listen to this. Pride, courage, grace, they're all there. When my husband needs a boost, he listens to this for inspiration. He imagines riding on a horse, my indomitable and gallant night in shining armour. Isn't it awesome?

Musical Empathy is a Superpower!

What is Musical Empathy?

Musical Empathy is a superpower!

When I Googled Musical Empathy, I learned all kinds of things. One of them was that Musical Empathy is a good thing to have in some games. If you have it, certain types of music can give you special powers. Music helps you win.

This is from a Superpower Wiki.
http://powerlisting.wikia.com/wiki/Superpower_Wiki

Musical Empathy:

Power/Ability to:

Gain various abilities based on the type of music one listens to and/or plays

The user can gain different abilities by listening to or playing different kinds of music. Alternatively, the user can utilize magical or high-tech instruments to achieve special effects.

Some of the known users:
Soul Eater Evans (Soul Eater) has adapted his piano skills into a means to control the soul wavelengths of others.

• The Kongs (Donkey Kong 64)
• Para Brothers (Dragon Ball GT)
• Barbara the Bat (Daigasso! Band Brothers/Super Smash Bros. Brawl)
• Punk Rocket ('Teen Titans: The Lost Episode)
• The Undead Elite (Lollipop Chainsaw)
• Bards (Dungeons & Dragons)
• Demyx (Kingdom Hearts)

Madama Butterfly - Sobbing at the Opera

Un bel di vedremo- Madama Butterfly, Puccini

I once cried pretty much the whole way through Madama Butterfly. The first moment when I heard the melody played by the orchestra, very early on, my heart was in my throat and the tears started to flow. It's perfectly tragic music for the perfect tragedy, such beautiful pain, elegant anguish. My anguish was not nearly as elegant as Cio-Cio San's. I sniffled and sobbed. I do remember having beautiful and elegant handkerchiefs though.
I don't like sobbing in public. I will have to watch the Les Mis movie at home when it comes on DVD.

Queen - 'Bohemian Rhapsody'

How does this song make you feel-Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen?
I love this. My daughters and I were late for church once because this came on the radio on the way to church and we sat and listened all the way to the end in the parking lot, because it's so good. We had to enjoy every little bit of it.
It's very satisfying. How?

Match Music to your Mood or Change your Mood with Music

So there are websites that do what my girlfriends and I did when we were teenagers!

We used to put sad, romantic music on when we were feeling heartbroken, or romantically frustrated, and it would make us feel even sadder and we'd wallow on basement couches crying.

In those days, we'd have to get up every 3 minutes to change the record.

Now, you can make a playlist on your iPod, or media player and listen to hours of music to match any mood. Or, you can get someone else to do it for you.

There are websites that will play music for you based not only on artists or genres, but also on moods. Here's an article that reviews 5 of them. You can choose from calm, energetic, dark, or positive on one, and another site suggests aggressive and melancholic music among their choices.

You can find places online that play relaxing music for you to help you meditate or fall asleep. When you're feeling stressed-out, you can calm down by listening to this calming music.

So, if you're feeling a bit sluggish, you can ask to be energized by a song? If you're feeling wimpy, you can ask for something aggressive to empower you?

Will this kind of musical empathy work for you? Can you change the way you're feeling by playing a song?

When music is dangerous: Driving Music

One of my first posts on my choir blog, Renate's Baton, was about the effect of music on driving.

(This Musical Empathy post was initially published in 2013, but I discovered the video links were broken, so I'm fixing it now in Sept. 2021.) 

I was commuting for a while and discovered that listening to the classical music station helped to keep me calmer and also helped to control my speeding.

That was fine except when a piece of music was so beautiful that it made me cry.

Why do I cry when I hear or see something really beautiful? Awe-inspiring things do that to people. But, I am really easily moved to tears, and I don't always know exactly why something has moved me.

Here's the post I wrote, called Driving Music:
(http://renatesbaton.blogspot.ca/2011/06/driving-music.html)

Here are a couple of the songs I mentioned:

This one makes me speed involuntarily: On the Floor, by Jennifer Lopez. When a song like this comes on, and I'm on the highway, especially the 404, but also on the 400, I just start hitting the gas! And, before I know it, I'm doing 130! It's interesting that I would say that this song has a strong driving beat. The rhythm propels you to move. Great for dancing but not so good for driving :

This one made me cry so that I couldn't see properly, had to find the kleenex, blow my nose, etc. Very distracting while I was driving! Luckily, it only had that effect the first time I heard it.:

BTW: My family doesn't love these guys as much as I do. They call them " The Singing Coyotes". 

Break Your Heart Lyrics-Taio Cruz ft. Ludacris: Fun and ironic

Love this song because it's so much fun and very positive-sounding, and makes you want to dance and be happy.
But, when you listen to the words, well, that guy is pretty awful and those girls are pretty stupid.

Reminds me of Mad World. The original version that I danced to was actually kind of sad, and watching the video was moody, but when you heard the record playing at a dance, it made you feel happy and cool. I love it. The music was upbeat and made me feel good.

And, then someone took it and made a beautiful moody and sad arrangement of it.

I love this one too. It's like a completely different song, but still the same. This one is simpler though, because you don't have that tension between the meaning and the presentation. It's moody and sombre.

Mozart Eine kleine Nachtmusik - Serenade in Gmajor, K-525, 2nd Movement --Happy Birthday, Mozart!

Happy Birthday, Mozart (Jan.27)!

Serene and formal. This makes me feel relaxed and comfortable, but not messy-relaxed. This is the comfort of order and balance, not a lazy day in pyjamas kind of comfort. It would sound great on a lazy-pj day looking out over a lake, holding a coffee or a brandy.

Owl City and Carly Rae Jepsen - "Good Time" (Lyric Video)

Owl City's "Good Time"

We listen to and dance with this song at Teen Choir. It's wonderfully positive.
We feel happy and silly, and feel a need to move with it too.

KOOL & THE GANG-CELEBRATION 1980

I went to a Kool and the Gang Concert ages ago. It was fabulous! Uplifting and energizing, fun and cool!
Celebrate Good Times! Here's a video of a performance of  "Celebration", a song to play at any party. 

This reminded me of the fun I have with the Owl City song "Good Time" at Teen Choir. We sing along to it and dance to it. It makes us all smile and move our bodies and feel very positive about ourselves and the world.

Visual response to Killing in the Name

some pictures that reflect my feelings from Killing in the Name

This is the product of a child's art therapy. I once had an angry student "make some pictures to show me your anger". It was cool. Thank God for lots of crayons in the classroom. This is a link to the source of this art: http://www.janetillman.com/art_gallery.html

http://www.play-and-stay.co.uk/news/thorpe-park-vomit-collector-114.html

Rage Against The Machine - Killing In The Name *Warning: language

And they say that pop is repetitive. Hee hee! (in my opinion, the best music has to be repetitive. if i like a melody-or a riff-a chorus-a hook-, i want to hear it repeated, to anticipate it)

I'm feeling anger and anxiety, frustration and fear when I hear this and watch this.

Grunting and swearing are totally not my thing. I generally try to avoid anger and conflict, and heavy metal :)

My sister likes this song, and finds it helpful for letting off steam when she's feeling frustrated and angry.

I guess it's like when my girlfriends and I felt sad and then listened to music that made us cry. The choice of music reflected and then intensified our feelings to help us deal with them.

The choice of music reflects and intensifies our feelings to help us deal with them.

Music can help us deal with our feelings.

Musical Empathy helps us deal with our feelings.

Greater Empathy makes a Better Musician

Lindsay Kupser, a jazz musician from Calgary, Alberta wrote about Empathy on the Berklee High School Jazz Festival Website Blog. 

She thought about the connection between empathy and music after a music teacher gave an empathy quotient test. 

Here's some of that blog post:

 I wondered why my teacher at a music school would want us to take this quotient. What did empathy have to do with music? But after taking the test and really thinking about it, I realized that my professor might have been on the right track. Perhaps empathy has a larger role in music than we realize.

I absolutely believe that being empathetic is extremely important in this life. In fact, without it, I don’t think relationships could really exist, musical or otherwise. Empathy enables us to put ourselves in another’s shoes, and that is the only way that help can be given to those who need it. Society would be a disaster without empathy, and I believe my empathetic nature makes me a good friend and someone who will give help when it is needed. The question is, does it make me a better musician? I believe it does, but I invite you to take this same quotient and decide for yourself if the questions being asked are applicable to music. You might be surprised!

I took the test and it turns out that I only have an average 'empathy quotient'. I like to think of myself as very empathetic!

I do believe that empathy makes music better- when it's involved in the making of the music, and when it's the listener whose empathy is involved in the appreciation of the music.

Loretta Goggi - Maledetta primavera (with lyrics) Back to Broken-hearted Teenager Times

I grew up in a predominantly Italian neighbourhood in Downsview, Ontario. We would get together in someone's basement and listen to songs on a record player. Usually lots of 45s.

Most of the time most of us were feeling the heavy-hearted sadness of unrequited love, which could change in a moment from that sadness to the bliss of hopeful love, and then to anxiety, and embarrassment, and then to frisky-playfulness, etc. We listened to emotional Italian love songs like Maledetta Primavera and Ti Amo, and hugged cushions in frustration. Sometimes someone would cry. It was great!

Musical Empathy: Scientific Explanation by David Byrne

I'm reading David Byrne's How Music Works. This is an excerpt.

The UCLA study proposed that our appreciation and feeling for music are deeply dependent on mirror neurons. When you watch, or even just hear, someone play an instrument, the neurons associated with the muscles required to play that instrument fire. Listening to a piano, we “feel” those hand and arm movements, and as any air guitarist will tell you, when you hear or see a scorching solo, you are “playing” it, too. Do you have to know how to play the piano to be able to mirror a piano player? Edward W. Large at Florida Atlantic University scanned the brains of people with and without music experience as they listened to Chopin. As you might guess, the mirror neuron system lit up in the musicians who were tested, but somewhat surprisingly, it flashed in non-musicians as well. So, playing air guitar isn’t as weird as it sometimes seems. The UCLA group contends that all of our means of communication—auditory, musical, linguistic, visual—have motor and muscular activities at their root. By reading and intuiting the intentions behind those motor activities, we connect with the underlying emotions. Our physical state and our emotional state are inseparable—by perceiving one, an observer can deduce the other.

People dance to music as well, and neurological mirroring might explain why hearing rhythmic music inspires us to move, and to move in very specific ways. Music, more than many of the arts, triggers a whole host of neurons. Multiple regions of the brain fire upon hearing music: muscular, auditory, visual, linguistic.

Read more: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/How-Do-Our-Brains-Process-Music-169360476.html#ixzz2IxRuhWh8 
Follow us: @SmithsonianMag on Twitter

about the book

Waves of Love and Gratitude, and...

These are a few visual representations of some of the feelings that I got from the song below. 

Yesterday's Emotional Response to Music: For Good, from Wicked, by Stephen Schwartz

Yesterday, I had a very strong response to a piece of music.

Now, it might have been exaggerated because I was picturing 2 of my choir members singing it, who have voices that I absolutely adore. And, maybe visions of the rest of the choir hearing it for the first time would have boosted the emotion factor. But, the song itself is strong. The words and the music are powerful.

I was really choked up, holding in my tears for the benefit of my 12-year-old who was listening with me.

Let's see what you think:

I chose this video, because it has the lyrics for you to read, and it doesn't show the singers. This is the one that I was listening to yesterday. I was picturing a man and a woman singing it, 2 particular people, but I think I would have been touched by it no matter what.

Because I knew you, I have been changed for good.

Musical Empathy

Music 'gives us feels', makes us feel feelings.

A good musical experience creates an emotional response.

The composer and lyricist, the arranger and all the other musicians who create music understand our feelings and create experiences that help us to explore those feelings.

• This is what I'm calling Musical Empathy. 
• And, our response is Musical Empathy too.

Music moves me. It moves me emotionally and physically. I almost always have a physical response (dancing, tapping, closing my eyes, crying...) and emotional responses, feelings. Sometimes I feel that I have to hold in my responses, try to keep them inside.

Now, I am easily manipulated by music and movies and even TV commercials, crying or laughing easily. And, that's got to be good for something.

I've been soul-searching. What am I good at? What can I do with what I've been given, my talents? I decided to work on this blog, which will provide people with music that I believe expresses particular feelings, and hopefully we can explore feelings and music together.