Ain’t that amazing how a certain beat gets us grooving while some of them make us calm, make you sit and feel those beautiful lyrics and get immersed in that melody? Music is the art of arranging sounds in time to produce a composition through the elements of melody, harmony, rhythm, and timbre. People are born with the ability to tell the difference between music and noise. Music can raise someone’s mood, get them excited, or make them calm and relaxed. Music also allows us to feel nearly or possibly all emotions that we experience in your lives. Music exerts a powerful influence on human beings. It can boost memory, build task endurance, lighten our mood, reduce anxiety and depression, stave off fatigue, improve your response to pain, and help you work out more effectively. Music is an important part of our life as it is a way of expressing our feelings as well as emotions. Some people consider music as a way to escape from the pain of life. It gives us relief and allows us to reduce the stress. Music can improve mood, decrease pain and anxiety, and facilitate opportunities for emotional expression. Research suggests that music can benefit our physical and mental health in numerous ways. Music therapy is used by hospice and palliative care board certified music therapist to enhance conventional treatment for a variety of illnesses and disease processes from anxiety, depression and stress, to the management of pain and enhancement of functioning after degenerative neurologic disorders.
Fast music can actually increase our heart rate, breathing, and blood pressure, while slower music tends to have the opposite effect. While the effects of music on people are not fully understood, studies have shown that when we hear music to our liking, the brain actually releases a chemical called dopamine that has positive effects on mood. Music can make us feel strong emotions, such as joy, sadness, or fear some will agree that it has the power to move us. According to some researchers, music may even have the power to improve our health and well-being.
A few benefits from music are as follows:
- Improves mood:Studies show that listening to music can benefit overall well-being, help regulate emotions, and create happiness and relaxation in everyday life. It has the power to change moods and help people process their feelings.
- Reduces stress: Listening to ‘relaxing’ music (generally considered to have slow tempo, low pitch, and no lyrics) has been shown to reduce stress and anxiety in healthy people and in people undergoing medical procedures (e.g., surgery, dental, colonoscopy). Research has found that listening to music can relieve stress by triggering biochemical stress reducers.
- Improves memory:Research has shown that the repetitive elements of rhythm and melody help our brains form patterns that enhance memory. In a study of stroke survivors, listening to music helped them experience more verbal memory, less confusion, and better focused attention. Music has been found to slow helping people with mild or moderate dementia remember episodes from their lives. Music memory is one of the brain functions most resistant to dementia. That’s why some caregivers have had success using music to calm dementia patients and build trusting connections with them.
- Lessens anxiety:In studies of people with cancer, listening to music combined with standard care reduced anxiety compared to those who received standard care alone. Studies also have shown that people in rehab after a stroke are more relaxed once they’ve listened to music for an hour. A study indicated that the body releases less cortisol, a stress hormone, when people listen to music. Music blended with nature sounds help people feel less anxious. Even people facing critical illness feel less anxiety after music therapy.
- Fights Depression: Listening to music, particularly classical combined with jazz, had a positive effect on depression symptoms, especially when there were several listening sessions conducted by board certified music therapists. The same research review found that drum circles also had above-average benefits for people dealing with depression.
- Eases pain:In studies of patients recovering from surgery, those who listened to music before, during, or after surgery had less pain and more overall satisfaction compared with patients who did not listen to music as part of their care. Specially trained music therapists use music to help alleviate pain in inpatient and outpatient settings.
- Helps children with autism spectrum disorder:Studies of children with autism spectrum disorder who received music therapy showed improvement in social responses, communication skills, and attention skills. Engaging in musical activities such as singing and playing instruments in one-on-one therapy can improve autistic children’s social communication skills, improve their family’s quality of life, as well as increase brain connectivity in key networks,
- Soothes premature babies:Live music and lullabies may impact vital signs, improve feeding behaviors and sucking patterns in premature infants, and may increase prolonged periods of quiet–alert states. The soothing sound of mom singing may help premature newborns breathe easier.
- Provides comfort:Music therapy has also been used to help enhance communication, coping, and expression of feelings such as fear, loneliness, and anger in patients who have a serious illness, and who are in end-of-life care. Any kind of relaxing, calming music can contribute to calmer moods and provide comfort. Calming music can be combined with cognitive therapy to lower anxiety even more effectively than conventional therapy alone.
- Improves exercise:Studies suggest that music can enhance aerobic exercise, boost mental and physical stimulation, and increase overall performance. Working out with music improves your mood, helps your body exercise more efficiently, and cuts down on your awareness of exertion. Working out with music also leads to longer workouts.
Music exerts a powerful influence on human beings. It can boost memory, build task endurance, lighten your mood, reduce anxiety and depression, stave off fatigue, improve your response to pain, and help you work out more effectively. Working with a music therapist is one effective way to take advantage of the many benefits music can have on your body, mind, and overall health.
