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We know music is pleasurable, the question is why?

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Re: We know music is pleasurable, the question is why?

#21

Post by default-kramer »

> There is something that still rings true of Mattheson’s general idea. We do tend to associate some musical features with being uplifted and others with melancholic reflection, both of which might afford a certain subsequent pleasure to listeners.

I have always wondered if we know how much of the emotion associated with music is learned from culture. To put it another way, is a sad song inherently sad? Or is it sad because the culture we grew up in tells us that it is sad? (The answer is probably some combination of both.) There must have been studies about this, but I haven't come across any yet.

Re: We know music is pleasurable, the question is why?

#23

Post by amelius »

phyzome wrote: post #18
mesarvagya wrote: post #17

Its because of Dopamine. I think everyone knows this. The same is true for Social media as well.

Isn't that like saying "because genetics" or "because chemistry" or "because biology"? It doesn't really answer the question that the article is asking.

Yeah, and also the brain's dopamine levels are not homogeneous. Your dopamine can be low in one part of the brain and high in another. Also, dopamine receptors can have low/high count in different areas.

Re: We know music is pleasurable, the question is why?

#24

Post by Jeff_Brown »

burp3141 wrote: post #9

My father loves music. Famously miserly, he wouldn't mind a monthly paycheck on an audio system. I on the other hand have never enjoyed music. I think it's a rebellion thing. But also that sad music made me despondent but happy music didn't affect me to the same extent. The way my father managed to reel me in was to ask me to predict where the musician would take the song. In things like Jazz or improvised music, thi…

> I enjoy music as a pattern matching exercise

Me too, writ very broadly. I'll hear a melody reflect the way a thought or a story develops, instrumentation reflecting the way conversation or traffic behaves. It's completely abstract and yet I feel like music reflects reality, and its deviations from the "truth" comment on reality.

I might just be weird. But if in fact a lot of people derive pleasure from the correspondence between music and reality, then part of a composer's job is to create such correspondences, bearing in mind that every listener is going to draw different ones. They have to look for the "average interpretation".

It's a weird job.

Re: We know music is pleasurable, the question is why?

#27

Post by LyndsySimon »

swaggyBoatswain wrote: post #13
rimunroe wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I played the viola and sang in chorus in middle school. I really enjoyed both--especially the viola--but I think my enjoyment was more of the mechanics of it rather than the actual music we were making. I also really enjoyed playing Guitar Hero in college in the same way. I've thought about taking up the guitar or piano since then, but haven't ever gotten around to it.

You sound like me, I get stuff done in dead silence. Music actually distracts me, playing songs in same loop helps out though. I still like practicing singing in the car though on the way to work, and guitar hero is fun to me too. Looking to learn to play the ukelele. I have like almost no musical intelligence, I can't remember song lyrics very well at all

> Looking to learn to play the ukelele

Funny you should say that - I've been slowly trying to learn guitar for a couple of months now. I picked up a ukulele last week on a whim and can't seem to put it down! It's simpler than a guitar, but there's still so much to learn: the chords themselves, of course, but also how chords are created and how that relates to the way the instrument is strung; strums/rhythm; fingerpicking; the way different types of strings change the character of the sound... it just goes on and on.

I'm not expert, but contact me if you want to chat sometime. My username is my real name, which is also my homepage's domain ( plus '.com') and my username on every social media service I use.

Re: We know music is pleasurable, the question is why?

#28

Post by shawn »

phyzome wrote: post #18
mesarvagya wrote: post #17

Its because of Dopamine. I think everyone knows this. The same is true for Social media as well.

Isn't that like saying "because genetics" or "because chemistry" or "because biology"? It doesn't really answer the question that the article is asking.

That's a bit like saying that Newton's gravity law doesn't explain why the planets move.

It's true that "because genetics" doesn't tell you why it happens, but it might be the deepest answer possible. We are servants to our genes.

Re: We know music is pleasurable, the question is why?

#29

Post by civility »

default-kramer wrote: post #21

> There is something that still rings true of Mattheson’s general idea. We do tend to associate some musical features with being uplifted and others with melancholic reflection, both of which might afford a certain subsequent pleasure to listeners. I have always wondered if we know how much of the emotion associated with music is learned from culture. To put it another way, is a sad song inherently sad? Or is it sad…

I have the same question about major and minor keys. It's pretty easy to play something somber in C-major, and something happy in A-minor... This is opposite to the conventional wisdom about keys, and I think it's a cultural thing.

When you play them right on top of each other, the three notes which are a half step lower do seem to sound sadder in comparison, but I think that says more about descending vs ascending tones rather than the key itself.

Re: We know music is pleasurable, the question is why?

#30

Post by crazynick4 »

mesarvagya wrote: post #17

Its because of Dopamine. I think everyone knows this. The same is true for Social media as well.

Yes but why does some music elicit dopamine and some does not? If I just play random notes for you, even if I do it with some sense of rhythm, will your body still produce dopamine?
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