The Stirring of the Emotions

[Megan]

Why is it that certain music is able to move us?
Now obviously there is a question of personal likes and dislikes and the old phrase , one man's meat is another man's poison comes to mind.
So we differ in what we like and dislike.
That I suppose in itself is a bit of a mystery. But looking at the area of what we like, why does certain music , certain chords and notes have this power to move us?
I am not a psychologist, but it seems to me that Freud did have some important things to say about this.
I think he was the first to discover , or comment on the subconscious.
Now this is a tremendously important idea, because when you get control of the subconscious, and by definition it is at our deepest level, then a musician or someone else, perhaps somebody unscrupulous even, can control that person and direct them where they want.
It is a bit like the rudder on a ship, which steers the ship one way or the other.
I am sure that Freud is right when he says that our subconscious self is profoundly more powerful in the ways in which we act than the conscious self.
He used the example of a person being like an iceberg, where 99% is the subconscious below the surface, as it were, and i% above. Ice is a good metaphor because he says these emotions are often frozen deep within us, and like iceberg's they can lead to disaster if not handled with care.
We all know how easy it can be to offend us, if someone, not knowing our code, so to speak, says something that hurts us.
Its an interesting area and it would be good to see how others look at it.

[Quijote]

Why is it that certain music is able to move us?

The rhythm?

[Quijote]

I mean, I can certainly 'rock' to Bach, Telemann and Vivaldi (not to name others ...), but I can't quite 'rock' to Pérotin, Palestrina and so on. And of course I can rock to a lot of Pop and other genres...
I mean, if music doesn't move you (not you specifically Megan, I mean 'you' as in 'people in general') you must be pretty dead, or a Taliban or something. Always very dodgy when sections of any given society try to ban music (like they tried to do in Iran during their revolution in the late 70s and 80s, and have tried to do in parts of Afghanistan in more recent times). Then again, in our own western culture the early Church tried to ban music, or certain types of music, and even certain types of intervals !!!!!!

[Sorrano]

The rhythm?

Harmonic and temporal rhythm?

[Peter]

Yes interesting post Megan - it can be the simplest little song such as Silent Night that can move people on an incredible scale far more than an hour long symphony! I remember as a child being moved to tears in our school carol concerts when the descants ascended into the rafters!
The performer of course makes all the difference - the same piece sung by two different people produces different responses in us. Also the circumstances of the performance play a part as in the moving performance of Beethoven's 9th to celebrate the fall of the Berlin wall or Shostakovich's Leningrad symphony performed whilst the city was under siege.

[Chris]

Then again, in our own western culture the early Church tried to ban music, or certain types of music, and even certain types of intervals !!!!!!

In the liturgy, certainly! I wish those laws (which are still in effect) were actually enforced. It would save me from hearing banal pop tunes during solemn moments!

It is interesting to see how people in different times and places regarded certain instruments, harmonies, and rhythms. It is enough to make one realize that it is not all simply relative to culture. And yet, connotation is very important.

[Enrique]

Why is it that certain music is able to move us?

I agree with Quijote, that rhythm is the motor behind all types of music. Easily understandable by listening one of Bach's allegros. Rhythm left aside, we must speak about a restricted class of people, to simplify. Let's take the musically educated ones. Here the vertical dimension is as important as the horizontal. Not quite what I mean. A good melody is quite enough for some people. He won't care, and even be bored by developments.

I think that music has intrinsic values, as art in general. So you can despise Beethoven and prefer cha-cha-cha. But this will only speak against you, and not Beethoven. That is, there is a science called aesthetics. Not everything is about tastes. Now, of course, aesthetics in its turn is based upon consensus. So, some sort of social subconscious could serve to define an aesthetics?

A question related to Megan's is: up to what point do the musical past mold our taste? Why can't most of us appreciate Schoenberg (say Alban Berg, more near to us)? Had we be born in a world where all music was atonal, when faced with tonal music, would we like it? Not going so far as atonality, we could speak about modal music. And people in the Middle Ages liked it. As we like music written in the major-minor system. So I think that the environment is almost all, it determines more than we realize what we like and like not. But environment is education. The environment educates us. So I think I'd be doing a good guess if I say it's all about education.