Tuesday, 29 January 2013

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". 



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