Music and The Brain

By Nirsha Saravanan

Music can heal the wounds that medicine cannot touch”, said by Debasish Mridha

25-years ago people assumed that one fraction of the brain, the left, was where the linguistics developed and stored. The other half, the right, was where music is dealt with. However, this misconception was blown out of the water thanks to enhancements in technology such as high-resolution neuroimaging.

The music stops at specialized processing units and associates with all parts of the brain: it triggers the auditory cortex where the tambour, rhythm, loudness and pitch are observed. The visual cortex is stimulated while watching a music concert or reading the lyrics of a track this hinders the motor cortex. Think of it as a motion, so that’s when you begin to clap along, tap your feet or dance. The cerebellum brings out the spontaneous responses that you sense. For instance, listening to a dark/depressing song makes you weep, hip hop music which is more upbeat makes you contented. The hippocampus contains the memory system that stores the music. When familiar tunes or rhythms are recognized, deep down in your brain, these memories are triggered, and your verbal feedback to that would presumably be, “Oh, I recognize that one”! And the opioid system deals with the excellent feels that you get if you adore the music or release cortisol that makes you stressed. So these are the reasons most of us encounter the complete state of euphoria in the nick of time by observing a melancholic song and have chills down our spine or goosebumps while hearing such a high-pitched opera. To put it simply, music is like a key that opens multiple gates to various spices of the intellect, the frontal, the rear, the inside, the out the right and the left so when all gates are open, the distinct flavors are brought out. This Delivers a range of unique attributes such as movement, sense and emotion, and let us be honest it is such a gratifying aroma, isn’t it?

Music is robust, while performing a piece of music, the artist engages multiple systems like the motor system, the timing system, the memory system and the auditory system. According to analysis, this engagement has produced good developments in the brain of children who were surveyed for 5 years. After playing music, their brains resulted in, the multitasking areas of the brain to light up with cognitive skills, decision making, social behavior and structural modifications of the brain as well! The survey revealed that minors who study music have deeper correlations between the right and the left hemispheres of the brain, which means they become better and more creative problem solvers! It turns out people would respond differently to a specific instrument or a type of music they once connected with. For example, if a person who had a habit of playing the cello in their childhood, they would presumably react better when they hear it. And this happens because the tract that connects the auditory and the emotional region becomes much stronger and gains more fiber, resulting in better communication between what they hear and how they feel. And when you make music, your brain is much more unconscious, so you lose total control! Music is more of an essential good rather than a recreational activity, and I want to tell you about this fascinating incidence, which proves it. Former congressional representative Gabrielle Giffords was shot and had damaged the left side of her brain that lead to a condition called aphasia; a situation when a person struggles to speak. She struggled to say the word “light” normally. When she was asked to sing a song that contains that word, she could say it! so music helps us regain our speech back by accessing alternative pathways in the brain. Therefore, I can say that Hans Christian Andersen was entirely correct when he said “where words fail, music speaks”

And what can music do to nonliving things? Well, you would’ve heard this one before, but there is another experiment that proved how water molecules had changed their shape and their responses to different music and human thoughts. A piece of soft classical music makes the water appear smooth with crystal clear structures and heavy metal would not have such a clear crystal. So, a positive thought makes the crystals beautiful, and a negative thought makes them not so beautiful.

And that’s simply because sound waves travel much faster in water than air and causes molecules to collide. My point here is that your life would be as exquisite as your thoughts. Music is an authentic part of life to all of us, from the alarm that wakes us up to the lullabies that put us to Sleep and is one which remained alive since our ancestor’s age. Music was never created, it lies in our heart, and we can only be alive when our heartbeats, right? And we can all agree how music can entirely change your mood. Listening to jubilant music every day can bring out pleasant emotions, positive vibes, and keep our life blissful. I love listening to music all the time and that’s the sole reason why I chose this particular topic over the others. Music interests me because it is more than just the strumming of the string or perfectly placed set of words. It is the starlight when dark skies that hang above, to me it is more like a best friend.

Thank you.

By Nirsha Saravanan