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Ruhan Katre

Mrs. Jenkins

English 4

Period 5

Research Paper

It was the annual Northgate Jazz Band concert at Yoshi's jazz club in Oakland. It's a

small room with seats packed right next to each other. The lights were dim when we got on

stage, and people were quietly whispering as we entered. Just like the rest of the venue, the stage

was small and could barely fit all of us in. As the brightness of the lights increased, we knew it

was time for us to play. I could see the intrigue on the faces of the audience as they waited for us

to start. Then we started playing. We played many songs, and after every song the audience

cheered. I could tell that they were enjoying the music. That's when I knew that being a musician

was for me.

When I was enrolled in elementary school, I asked my parents if I could play percussion

in the school band. From then on, each day after school, I would come home and play on my

practice pad. I made some of my first friends in that band. Some of those friends are still my

friends to this day.

But I think I really fell in love with music when I listened to jazz for the first time. It was

an album by the great jazz pianist Oscar Peterson, entitled ​We Get Requests. I​ remember

listening to it and thinking, “I have never heard something like this ever.” I wondered why each

song had someone soloing. I did not think that that was possible in music. I was only around nine

years old, so I didn't have a strong grasp of what music could be. But now I do. So with all the
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experience I have, I ask the question, “How do music and the arts affect people socially and

emotionally?”

When creating music, writers have an emotional basis for their songs. They use the notes

that they play to evoke these emotions in their listeners. The audience feels the emotions being

expressed through the music. The more authentic a performance, the better the audience reacts.

Why is this? What makes emotions resonate through music? “​Psychological approaches

to musical emotions have been heavily influenced by the theory of basic emotion.” (Flaig) “The

theory states that human beings have a limited number of emotions such as joy, sadness, and

anger. Each one of these emotions manifests itself in recurring patterns associated with

behavioral components.” (Frontiers in Psychology)

Psychologist LB Meyer, an expert in the relationship between music and psychology, has

theorized that “more stable pitches are felt as points of repose, and less stable pitches are felt to

point toward, or be attracted to, the more stable ones” (Flaig). This means that stable notes—or

notes that are the root—are a release of tension, while unstable notes—or notes that are not the

root—are points of tension that are waiting for the root to release the tension. This creates the

feeling or emotion of longing or want, and when the stable note or root is played then that want

is fulfilled. For example, the chord progression called a II-V-I in jazz starts with the tension

being built from the second chord and climaxing at the five chord. It finally resolves or releases

tension when the root (or one chord) is played. He also stated that this only created the effect of

emotion, not real emotion.

Another psychologist and music theorist, D.B. Huron suggests that expectancy evokes

emotions, not merely affect. While Meyer theorized that it was not true emotions but just the
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effect of emotions, Huron challenges that claim and theorized that they were directly tied to

emotions and the parts of the brain. “He adopts a two-process approach, which posits a fast

time-scale ​reaction​ and a slow time-scale ​appraisal​” (Flaig). He states that, “specific emotional

responses involve primitive circuits that are conserved throughout mammalian evolution, and

function relatively independently of cognitive circuits” (Flaig). This means that he believes that

when you hear music, it activates certain neural pathways in your brain, sending signals that

activate certain emotions.

The effect of music on the brain can be seen through mental illness or disease. For

example, children with autism can be calmed by listening to certain slow melodies. This is

shown in ​Music Therapy For The Autistic Child​ by Juliette Alvin Auriel Warwick, in which she

says, “the effect of music reduces agitation and increases calmness and slows heart rate”

(Warwick). Another example of this is in Alzheimers, a disease that slowly degrades the memory

of the person with the disease. Alzheimers is caused by a blockage of neural signals in the brains.

But when people with Alzheimers hear music of their past—for example, jazz—their faces “​light

up as though they were truly back in the 1930s and 40s” (Levich).

According to Hajime Fukui, a psychology professor, “recent studies revealed that music

is closely associated with hormones which govern the emotion and human behavior, especially

with steroid hormones including sex hormones. It has been shown that there is a correlation

between spatial ability or music ability and testosterones [28], and listening to music has effects

on testosterones and cortisol” (Fukui). Cortisol and testosterone are used to treat Alzheimers and

other forms of dementia.

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Music fosters focused and healthy emotions, and is used by many therapists across the

world to aid in mental exercises for people with depression, who use it as both a coping

mechanism and as a soothing tool to help patients to deal with their symptoms. “​Music is related

to strong emotional experiences on the behavioral and neural level[​16​,​17​], and the processing of

its emotional content seems to be affected by acute depression” (Aust).

Interview 1:

Mo Levich, a well respected musician, business owner, and Director of The Rossmoor

big band, shared some insights on how music affects the human mind and how music can affect

and influence social and societal change. Levich first introduces himself and tells us the year in

which he was born, March 3rd, 1952. He then goes on to explain how he views the emotions of

the listeners during a concert, saying that since most of the people he plays for are in their 80s or

90s, they react very happily when listening to his music. He then goes more into detail by

explaining that quite a few people he plays for have the disease known as Alzheimers.

Alzheimers is a disease that affects the neural signals that access memories. Levich explains that

when people with Alzheimers are going about their daily lives they seem like shells of

themselves, almost like ghosts, but as soon as they hear the music that they grew up listening

to—in this case, jazz—they light up as though they were truly back in the 1930s and 40s. Levich

also explains that the second the music stopped, people with Alzheimers would go back to their

ghostly look, as if absolutely nothing had happened.

Levich then goes on to talk about how music impacted him emotionally and socially. He

talked about the Beatles who were the most famous rock band of the time. He explained that as a
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child growing up, the influence of the Beatles was not just the music they played, but also the

clothes they wore. Everyone wanted the haircuts they had and the turtle-neck shirts that were the

signature part of their outfit. Levich also said that this was the first time that a band from the UK

had become as popular as it did, and it started a revolution within the young crowd in Britain that

spread to the US and beyond.

After talking about his past experience with music, Levich went back to talking about the

Rossmoor Big Band and the emotions that his band members feel when rehearsing and when

playing in a performance. Levich firstly states that the difference in rehearsal and in performance

is big, and it is important in learning how outside aspects can affect the emotions and music. He

explains that during rehearsal, the band members are stressed with school work or other

commitments, and find it hard to be focused and play with joyful emotions. On the other hand,

during a performance, they feel relaxed and can express real emotions as they are completely

focused on the music they are playing.

Lastly, Levich talked about how he feels during rehearsal and during performances. He

says that during rehearsal it's hard for him to keep the band focused, but he doesn’t usually feel

angry. It's more that he thinks of it as a process to eventually get to a goal. As for the

performances, Levich is really excited and wants to bring the same energy into his conducting as

his band members are to their instruments.

The social aspect of music is less theoretical and more grounded in history, but that does

not mean it is less important. In fact some may argue that it is what truly gives music its

emotional power. In America, our music mostly originates from African-American slaves, who

brought their rhythms here. Over time, these musical styles would be combined with Western
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music, but they still had the power and rhythmic complexity of African rhythms. This fusion of

the two types created a basis for all music that followed in America. Jazz, for example, was

created by African-Americans who were oppressed by rich white people. It was played in clubs

and bars sometimes to entertain the same white people that were oppressing them. This turned

jazz into a movement of sorts, because jazz musicians would use the emotions they felt towards

their oppressors, whether that was sadness or anger, to bring power and feeling to what they

wrote and played. That uplifted their music to new heights.

As the civil rights movement of the 1950-60s was rapidly gaining strength, jazz music

became even more socially conscious. Jazz musicians such as John Coltrane actively supported

civil rights leaders such as El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, better known as Malcom X, and the Rev.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. This is shown, for example, in an interview that John Coltrane gave

to interviewer Frank Kofsky,

“Coltrane was deeply involved in the civil rights movement and shared many of Malcolm X’s

views on black consciousness and Pan-Africanism which he incorporated into his music, but his

most overt nod to the movement came in the song ​Alabama,​ written in response to the 1963

Birmingham church bombing that took the lives of four little girls. (Mendoza)”

Not only did musicians infuse the emotions they were feeling into their music, they

would ​participate in rallies and strikes and would feel the collective emotions of their hurting

brothers and sisters and put those emotions into their music, creating even more powerful songs.

During this era, it wasn't just jazz musicians who were socially involved. Rock and Roll, the

Blues, and Gospel music were also very socially aware and when it comes to gospel music sung

in churches, the songs sung were about freedom and equality which are still songs sung today.
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Songs like ​Certainly Lord,​ ​Keep Your Eyes on the Prize, ​and ​We Shall Overcome w
​ ere popular

songs of the 1950s and 60s and are still popular today.

“‘We Shall Overcome,’ a song with its roots in the ​Highlander Folk School​ during the

labor struggles of the 1940s, became the unofficial anthem of the Civil Rights movement. Wyatt

Tee ​Walker​, executive director of King’s ​Southern Christian Leadership Conference​, said, ‘One

cannot describe the vitality and emotion this one song evokes across the Southland. I have heard

it sung in great mass meetings with a thousand voices singing as one; I’ve heard a half-dozen

sing it softly behind the bars of the Hinds County prison in Mississippi; I’ve heard old women

singing it on the way to work in Albany, Georgia; I’ve heard the students singing it as they were

being dragged away to jail. It generates power that is indescribable (Carawan, 11).’” (Stanford)

In the 1970s,​,​ while progress was made, racism was still common. Along with that,

America's race to beat communism led to thousands of lives being lost in the Korean and

Vietnam wars. Guitarist Jimi Hendrix, a young musician at the time, was deep in the anti-war

movement. As his popularity increased, he was invited to play The Star Spangled Banner at

Woodstock in 1969, where he played the anthem in a way that nobody had heard before. He

shredded on his guitar to simulate the sounds of bombs bursting and guns firing. The audience

was in awe at his performance. It sent a powerful message to the American people, a message

that said: this is the tragedy of war, and this is what our country will be known for if we continue

down this path. According to NPR “a whole new generation experienced another controversial

war and Hendrix’s rendition of our national anthem resembled a new form of protest to the wars

that were going on.” (NPR)

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Music has been a journey for me ever since I was a toddler. But by researching how our

brains make emotional associations with certain melodies and chords, and how those melodies

were created through the emotions already felt by musicians so that they could express what they

felt inside themselves, I have learned that music is unknown to us. It's hard to explain because

music is ever changing. The changes to music are parallel to the changes of social climate. Music

resonates with people, activating parts of their brains to invoke an emotion, whether that emotion

is happiness, sadness, or anger.

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Works Cited

Aust, Sabine, et al. “Music in Depression: Neural Correlates of Emotional Experience in

Remitted Depression.” ​World Journal of Psychiatry​, vol. 3, no. 2, June 2013, pp. 8–17.

PubMed Central,​ doi:10.5498/wjp.v3.i2.8.

Benedict, Cathy, et al., editors. ​The Oxford Handbook of Social Justice in Music Education​.

Oxford University Press, 201AD.

Contreras, Felix. “The Many Sides Of ‘The Star Spangled Banner.’” ​NPR.Org,​

https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=99505099. Accessed 12 Mar.

2020.

Crichton, Laura. “Music Therapy for the Autistic Child (Second Edition) by Juliette Alvin

and Auriel Warwick. Oxford: University Press, 1991. £9.95, 3152 Pp.” ​British Journal

of Music Education​, vol. 10, no. 3, Nov. 1993, pp. 276–77. ​DOI.org (Crossref)​,

doi:10.1017/S0265051700001868.

Flaig, Nicole K., and Edward W. Large. “Dynamic Musical Communication of Core

Affect.” ​Frontiers in Psychology,​ vol. 5, Mar. 2014. ​PubMed Central,​

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00072.

Frazier, Marco. “African Americans Music History.” ​Oakland Public Library​,

https://oaklandlibrary.org/blogs/library-community/african-americans-music-history.

Accessed 5 Mar. 2020.

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Juslin, Patrik N. “What Does Music Express? Basic Emotions and Beyond.” ​Frontiers in

Psychology​, vol. 4, Sept. 2013. ​PubMed Central,​ doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00596.

“What Does Music Express? Basic Emotions and Beyond.” ​Frontiers in Psychology​,

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Parncutt, Richard, and Gary McPherson, editors. ​The Science & Psychology of Music

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University, © Stanford, et al. “Songs and the Civil Rights Movement.” ​The Martin Luther

King, Jr., Research and Education Institute,​ 14 Aug. 2017,

https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/songs-and-civil-rights-movement.

Wright-Mendoza, Jessie. “How Jazz and the Civil Rights Movement Came Together in the

1960s.” ​Blank on Blank,​ 20 May 2015,

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