Staff Writer- Mary Athorp

I was driving back to campus last week from my home in Wisconsin, and I felt a bit subdued by the drive. And so, to mitigate my subdued state, I decided that some music was necessary, and I knew exactly what song I was going to play. As Laura Bell Bundy’s “So Much Better” from Legally Blonde blasted through my speakers (I, of course, belting along to each word), I became struck by how my mood was almost instantly changed. I quickly became fascinated—how do I know every word? Why does the rhythm of that particular verse make me smile? Why do I literally get excited to hear the key change? Ultimately, I didn’t find any answers to my questions at the moment (hence why I chose to write and research about it this week), but I did reach a somewhat interesting conclusion:

Music is weird.

I mean, when you really boil it down to the bones of what music is, it’s just words that we say at varying intonations and speeds. What’s even more odd is when a group of people, strangers even, can sing all of those same intonations and speeds at the same time. It’s fascinating, really, how something so abstract can create such cohesiveness in our society and pleasure in our lives.

Music is generally regarded as an art form, but its power and appeal are most directly related to science and history. What’s crazy is that music predates history. Historians literally can’t pinpoint a time when music was “invented” or why people began making it. It’s simply always been there. However, most theories suggest that nature was the main inspiration for the first forms of music, mostly referencing how people would try to mimic the sounds they heard and then turn them into original creations. If nothing else, the emergence of music into society demonstrates the sheer vastness of human creativity and how beautiful our brains really are.

Science, on the other hand, articulates this beauty in more exact terminology and gives insight as to why we’re able to be creative with music and fall in love with it so profoundly.
Truth is, we’re programmed to like it. When we listen to music, two primary neurotransmitters are released: dopamine and serotonin.

Our brain uses a dopamine reward system. When we are successful in reaching a goal, dopamine is released, precisely like a prize for our brains. In the same way, our minds anticipate specific outcomes and climaxes in music, which is almost as if the music is “reaching a goal.” As those moments happen, dopamine is released and… (you guessed it) you feel happy. This anticipation is completely unconscious (and completely insane!).

While dopamine works in rewarding our brains, serotonin works more closely with our mood and ability to streamline thoughts – think happiness, calmness, and focus. With this in mind, listening to music triggers the hippocampus and the amygdala, which are essentially the areas where serotonin (among other things) is produced. This “triggering” works on the basis of memory. Oftentimes, certain melodies, lyrics, or complete songs can be associated with specific events or moments in someone’s life. Furthermore, music relies fundamentally on repetition, meaning that our brain recognizes the familiarity in songs either based on our own personal experiences or the repetition of rhythms or tones. All of this is to say that the recognition involved in experiencing music increases the synthesis of serotonin. Our brain tends to favor things that it remembers, essentially creating a domino effect of emotion and stimulation.

Rhythm and intonation alone in music work remarkably inside the mind, contributing, of course, to the dopamine and serotonin phenomena explained above. Rhythm is an organization of sounds. Our brain is an intricate organization of many different processes. Organization likes organization, and therefore, our brain likes rhythm. The pace and complexity of what’s going on inside our minds matches the pace and complexity of whatever music we’re listening to, and elicits a physiological response. For example, a fast tempo with low complexity would make a person feel alert but also secure and confident, while a slow tempo with high complexity would make a person feel calm and curious.

Intonation is more self-explanatory and dry cut, but interesting. It’s as simple as this: major keys are associated with positive emotions, minor with negative; dissonance causes tension and anxiety, and consonance causes relaxation. Our brain likes what it likes and dislikes what it doesn’t.

And so, music is still weird. But, so are our brains. How cool is it that their paired weirdness continues to introduce new concepts and ideas that take a car ride from subdued to sensational? If nothing else, let this article express my love and recommendation for Laura Bell Bundy’s “So Much Better”. It’s a belter— you’ll love it, I promise.