How expressive is music? It’s so expressive that it can make you cry, make you laugh, work up your anger or calm you down when things go wrong. I’ll never forget when I heard, “When Something’s Wrong With My Baby, Something’s Wrong With Me”. The truth is that those of us who love listening to music feel the depth, the warmth, the pain and the love of life, we feel the benefit of music flowing into our ears and hearts.
The joy that music brings is universal throughout the world. In any language or culture, music is there. We dance to it, we watch it performed and it touches us when we’re open to it. We pick the songs we want to hear at our loved one’s funerals or memorials. Sometimes we even pick the music for our own memorials!
I get so adrenalized when I hear heartfelt music performed live that I can’t stop smiling. I imagine the performer’s state of mind, and how they pour all their feeling into a song, hoping the crowd will come along with them. In my experience, the crowd will come with you!
And, I don’t know if there’s anything better than music that makes us laugh. With me, it’s either that band is so good, or so committed, or both, that I can’t help cracking up. Funny songs are fantastic too! I have friends who’ve worked with Weird Al Yankovic, and have witnessed the talent and professionalism he uses with his tunes. The result is we feel better when we listen to it. Lots of artists have a unique take on a funny or weird situation, and the song works because we can relate. Either they are so good at describing something we can imagine, or they remind us of a situation we’ve been in and we go right along for the ride.
One of my wishes for all of us humans is that we use music to get deeper inside of our hearts and let it help us feel everything. Let us use it to walk in the shoes of character that the singer or musician illuminates in the song, to find that humble place of sympathy and empathy with each other.
It’s just like being in a crowd at a concert. We don’t have to know each other to experience joy and excitement together, to really feel what the performer is giving to us. We get willing to slow down and just be there and feel it. That is the power of music, it brings us together. I wanna get some more of that.
Photo by Mark Schierholz
