Introduction

As we all know, music is an art consisting of harmony, melody and rhythm. It is a universal thing with multiple genres and multiple languages around the world; some genres consist of pop, folk, hip-hop, rap, soca, reggae and many more.

Music affects multiple parts of the brain, the hippocampus (helps process emotions and memories) the cerebellum (helps process rhythm and physical movement, as well as other parts that stimulates the brain’s reward system releasing dopamine, a neurotransmitter that plays a role in providing pleasure and motivation. This supports the idea that people listen to music for a variety of reasons at different times and even at different consistencies. These 4 sources explain the impact music has on humans.

Source 1

When you think of music, what do you think of? Personally, I think of not only the melody but the lyrics^[1] of the song  and what the artist is trying to say. Singer- songwriter Tricia Fox Ransom does the same as she suggests  in her 2021 article, “A Case for Lyrics and How They Impact Our Emotions”, for MAPP Magazine (a magazine whose mission is to inspire growth and collaboration between alumni from Penn MAPP, also known as students who received Masters of Applied Positive Psychology).In her erectile, Ransom reaches out to singer songwriters like herself as well as people who are curious in the emotional effect of mucic to figure out if lyrics truly impact our emotions. Ransom discusses the results of her capstone project by taking a look at multiple studies taken place in order to answer her question,”Does music truly impact our emotions?”

There was never a world without music, says Ransom, “it’s never been documented” (Ransom,paragraph 6), music is much more accessible in today’s society making music listened to more often.At the end of her capstone  Ransom overall found that music and words impact our emotional state. According to Ransom, because speech connects to music we can take advantage of neuroplasticity ^[2]when 5 conditions are met: Overlap^[3], Precision^[4], Emotion^[5],Repetition^[6] and Attention^[7] (OPERA).

Everyone has different preferences and engagement when it comes to listening to music. Some people listen to the songs for the lyrics while others just listen to the song for the beat and some may even listen to the song just to listen to it. “Music and lyrics support each other and work together to co-create an experience… music on its own has a dynamic ability to influence emotion”(6). According to Tricia Ransom, the way that we interact with music and lyrics could impact our emotional health. Her curiosity now extends as she tries to find the impact of not listening to the lyrics of songs.

Despite the fact that Tricia Fox Ransom thoroughly explains her point and has multiple sources to connect her ideas, this source was not as effective as it could have been. Ransom just provides quotes from other sources and provides  her opinions on the sources, she doesn’t really explain the ideas the author is presenting.

To make this article better, Ransom could have provided more information about her capstone, she could have done some part  of the experiments herself, she also could have spent a little more time in explaining the sources and analyzed the sources a little bit more.

Despite trying to connect with her audience by providing her own personal experience when it came to writing songs, Ransom could have spent more time connecting with her audience. Because she is writing for MAPP magazine, we know that her audience is mostly songwriters and alumni with a MAPP degree; Ransom could have done a better job appealing to  them emotionally to convince them the importance of making sure the words of the song impacts someone’s life for the better.

Source 2

Just like Tricia Fox Ransom, pianist Robin Spielberg emphasized the emotional and physical benefits of music in her 2014 TEDX Lancaster^[8] speech.

Robin Spilberg had a smooth pregnancy until she got the news that she needed to have an emergency C Section in order to take out her twins, months before their due date. Ultimately only one twin survived, Valarie Spielberg. Valaarie was in the NICU^[9] for weeks, she was the size of a COCA COLA.The NICU was “a very loud place… it had the energy of an emergency room… it was not the kind of environment that you think of when you think of babies that need to heal”(Spilberg). In order to make the NICU feel more like home and feel more comfortable, Spilberg asked the nurses if she could bring the CD recordings of her playing the piano, the nurses said yes. As she played her recording,Spilberg and the docs noticed that the vital signs of not only Valarie but of all the babies in the NICU increased weekly; the babies got stronger because of the music. Years later as a child, Robin Spilberg noticed that her daughter was struggling to remember certain vocabulary words for school, so instead of sticking with her C avaaege, Mrs. Speilberg put the vocabulary into a song so Valarie could remember. This method caused Vlarie to change from being  a C student to now an A student.

By providing multiple personal examples of music’s effect in her daughter’s life , at the end of her speech, Spilberg proves to her audience that music can have a positive effect on not only memory but a person’s ability to heal.

Robin Spilbergs TEDxLanchestrer was very effective in convincing her audience of curious like minded people who want to change the world that music has healing properties.

At the beginning and ending of her speech, Spilberg played a beautiful piece in order to appeal to the audience’s emotion as well as to appeal to the mental state of her audience to somehow heal them with a little song. This made the audience think about music even more in a broader aspect.

By providing her personal experiences and the surprise that she also felt when seeing that the music lead to her daughter’s vital signs increasing, being the same surprise that the audience had, she was able to connect to her audience way more, in ways that most people don’t get to do.

The instrumental piece played at the beginning and end of her speech could even help the author in Source 1, Tricia Ransom, find an answer to her question “can you still have an emotional response to music if you aren’t listening or if there are no lyrics at all?” Speilberg presents a different aspect of music that Ransom didn’t, she presented the idea that music can be emotionally healing as well as mentally and physically beneficial in your everyday life.

Source 3

In this study, 10 researchers, David A. Alter, Mary O’Sullivan, Paul I Oh, David A Redelmeier, Susan Marzilini, Richard Liu, Mart Forhan, Michael Silver, Jack M Goodman and Lee R. Bartel,  exploring the capability and effectiveness of tempo pace synchronized music ^[10]on patients with cardiovascular disease in a cardiac rehabilitation center in a sports medicine study for the SpringerOpen.^[11]

Researchers took 34 patients who were randomly allocated to  two strategies: 1)listening to no music with usual care control or 2) listening to tempo pace synchronized audio deceit with a personalized playlist plus usual care. These personalized playlists were restricted to music with tempo approximately close to the  prescribed  exercise walking pace to achieve tempo pace synchronous. At the end of the study researchers found that the group with the personalized playlist had an increased volume of physical activity by over 100 minutes, proving that tempo pace synchronized music is not only feasible and efficacious but it is also connected to the  dopamine in the brain, providing more motivation to exercise.

These authors had one goal, which was to prove if tempo pace synchronized music is feasible and efficacious, and they did that very well. Just like any proper study, this one provided a hypothesis, a method, results and also evidence to back up their results which gave the reader all that we needed to know.

This source was also very straightforward and easy to follow. The only thing that the authors could have done to make their results even more reliable would be to provide a group allocated to music twice a week, to compare their results to the other groups to see how well tempo pace synchronized music actionlist affects the physical activity of the patients.

Source 4

Music editor for the Guardian^[12], Ben Beaumount-Thomas, explores the acts of drill music on increased crime in the UK in his 2018 article ,“Is UK drill music really behind London’s wave of violent crime?”

Drill music is a style of trap music defined by its violent omniosu beat, it tells “tales of violence in rat featuring since the 90s”. It originated recently in the UK and has since expanded to many cities around the world such as New York.

According to Beaumoun-Thomas’ article, many claim that gang violence was catylsted by drill music, thy calim that “murders and stabbings plauging London and other citied are directly linked to an ultraviolent new form of music” drill music. In a report given by Craig Pinket and Shona Robinson Edward “music videos are a platform where they provide gang members with a sense of power and authority” (Thomas, paragraph 10)just by the lyrics of the sound and the actions taken in the videos. Some of the words in the songs can be taken as threats, or even taken out of context causing harm to others.

Despite many thinking that drill music creates more violence, there are still a handful of people that believe drill music doesn’t harm anyone, some people just take it out of context and run with it. DJ Bempah shares “if that’s what you see in your environment, that’s what you portray in your lyrics…. You can glamourize it but you can’t force it” (10). He is basically saying that these rappers are not responsible for the actions other people take. “Our art is imitating life not the other way around”(14); music is a way of expression, many people take it many different ways but at the end of the day, it is all provided for a specific audience.

Effectiveness.Ben Beaumount-Thomas’ article does a great job in providing the opinions of all people when it comes to talking about the effect of drill music. Because this is a news article, Thomas clearly doesn’t provide a stance which provides the people of the UK or people interested in the effects of drill music a clear view of what’s going on in the world when it comes to this topic.

Beaumont- Thomas provides a somewhat opposing view to  Tricia Fox Ransom. Yes , just like Ransom he provides points supporting the importance that lyrics have on a community but he also provides a point of view that supports the fact the lyrics are just stories and don’t really mean a lot.

Conclusion

Overall music has made an impact on the community and these 4 sources explain the effects.

 

Work Cited:

Ransom, Tricia F. “A Case for Lyrics and How They Impact Our Emotions.” MAPP Magazine, 31 July 2021, www.mappmagazine.com/articles/a-case-for-lyrics-and-how-they-impact-our-emotions.

Spielberg, Robin, narrator. The healing power of music: Robin Spielb. 2014. Youtube.com, www.youtube.com/watch?v=8LTusPwrH9E&t=331s.

TedxLancaster . www.tedxlancaster.com/.

Alter, David A., et al.  Springer Open, 2015. CCNY| Libraries,  sportsmedicine-open.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s40798-015-0017-9.

Beaumont -Thomas, Ben. “Is UK drill music really behind London’s wave of violent crime?” The Guardian, 9 Apr. 2018, www.theguardian.com/music/2018/apr/09/uk-drill-music-london-wave-violent-crime.

---

^[1] The words that make up a song.

^[2] The brain’s ability to make connections.

^[3] Overlap in the brain’s network that processes both speech and music.

^[4] Music is more in demand on shared networks than speech.

^[5] Music’s ability to conduct an emotion.

^[6] The musical activity that activated the emotion is frequently repeated.

^[7] Ability to engage the listener.

^[8]  “These events,presented in front of rich people who want to invest in a good cause as well as people who are interested in the topic at hand, bring together like-minded people that want to change the world, or themselves.”They connect with one another, share their dreams and goals, and find comfort knowing that there are others just like them.  A TEDx event combines live speakers and TED talk videos to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. It exposes attendees to different viewpoints.  It inspires, motivates, and educates.  It also highlights the great “ideas worth spreading” that are currently taking place right in your own area”  (Tedx, paragraph 1).

^[9] A neonatal intensive care unit,is an intensive care unit specializing in the care of  premature newborn infants.

^[10] Shown to reduce physical activity extortion and increase exercise performance.

^[11] A web page allowing you to access journals and books,written by professionals ,covering all areas of science

^[12] A very popular British daily Newspaper.