Music for Health

We often consider listening to music to be an enjoyable experience, but did you know that it can also be beneficial for our health?

A lot of research in listening to and participating in music comes out of dementia and mood research. These programs, either formally completed with a music therapist, or general music programs run by community organizations, provide social connection and an immersive experience that activates many parts of our brain function (think sensory, motor, memory, planning areas just to start!). Plus, it's fun for patients!

It’s thought that participating in music programs helps with emotional expression and that the musical qualities in our voices help us express how we are feeling (tone, how loud we are speaking, how quickly we are speaking) are at the root of where musical expression and communication comes from.

What happens in our bodies when we listen to music?

Like most complicated tasks, when we listen to music, we are activating many different areas of our brain. If we are just listening, this involves using our auditory nervous system, activating our memory areas if we know the song, we activate language areas if there are lyrics, and rhythm areas if we are keeping track of the beat (either mentally or by tapping our toe - which in that case, we are also using motor areas of our brain!).

What happens when we play music?

When we play music - the same listening systems as above are activated, plus we recruit additional areas to help us create the music. These include more sensory areas, which let us know based on sound and touch if we have played the correct note - or put our hands in the right place - we use motor areas to control our breathing or playing, we use our prefrontal cortex to plan our next movements and upcoming parts of the song, if we are reading music, we use our visual cortex, and if we are singing lyrics - we use different areas of our brain to create words!

Understanding why we enjoy music? This is still a bit of a mystery!

Research has found that when we listen to music we enjoy, our brains are flooded with dopamine, our neurotransmitter associated with reward.

We also tend to prefer music with “medium” complexity, meaning we enjoy music that is similar to what we know, but also a bit novel or different. This element of surprise is another area that explains why we enjoy music - especially live performance.

The concept of “groove” in music, or the quality that drives a piece forward, comes from the rhythm of the piece. We expect a certain regularity to this rhythm, but sometimes in live performance, drawing out the notes or compressing them helps communicate emotional content. This often occurs in live performance, and often captures the elements of our emotions - that real conversations, expressions of emotions like love, sadness, forgiveness don’t happen at a perfectly rhythmically timed beat.

Pretty cool to see how something we might just find enjoyable, can actually support our health - and that healthy emotional expression and connection can be linked to some of the reasons why we enjoy music!