What is music?

It calms the soul, it can energize you, it can tell a story, all these things can be done with music. Music is everywhere, you hear it in movies, on the radio, city functions, churches, restaurants and the list go on. Music has the ability to affect us in different ways and continues to remain a prominent staple in our society. What I want to do today is talk about what music is, when did it first start and the role it plays in our society. Hopefully by the end of this you’ll have a better understanding of what music is.

What is music? Well according to Google, music is the vocal or instrumental sound (or both) combined in such a way to produce beauty of form, harmony and expression of emotion. Another definition is a harmonious pattern of notes that are pleasing to the ear. Think of music as a work of art, and instead of using paint, you express yourself with sounds and feeling. Music consists of 3 things, melody, harmony and rhythm. Melody is a pleasing/agreeable arrangement of sounds/notes. Harmony is a combination of different musical notes played/sung at the same time to produce pleasing sound. Rhythm is the repeated pattern of sound or movement.  Just remember if you hear a song/musical piece that is aesthetically pleasing to your ears is considered music.

Music has been around for many years and has evolved so much over time. This leads me to another question, when did it start? Well its very difficult to determining when music first began, but there’s been an ample amount of evidence gathered over the years from cave paintings to religious text that try to answer that question. The first instrument was a simple flute (very early wind instrument) which dates back as far as 67,000 years ago. Even with that being said you still have acknowledge that there are many forms of music. Some forms of music include, beating out a rhythm with a stick, clapping hands, stomping feet and even the human voice. The many forms of music lead to a broadened perspective of what music is, which makes it difficult to pinpoint its origin.

The spread of music throughout the world has an effect on the way we live our lives. It plays a role in enhancing our intellect, human development, anxiety, pain reduction and behavior.  For example, did you know that unborn babies who are exposed to music in the womb showed significant growth in their overall mental, cognizant, behavioral and emotional development compared to those that were not exposed. Music also has to ability to influence our group/social identity. For example, in our youth, we often choose our circle of friends by the kind of music that resonates with us. And the connection sometimes starts by singing the song, imitating the artist or relate to a shared understanding of the message in the song/musical piece among us.

As you can see music has a tremendous effect on our lives. Overall music is something that’s never going away. Its important because its been around for years and continues to maintain its place in our lives.

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