Music, right along with everything else, has changed. Not a revolutionary sentence but here are three major ways music has changed over the centuries (millennia). I’m not talking about the surface layers of music – pitches, rhythm, instruments, etc. – but, three of the deepest attributes of music. (1)The connection between music and movement, (2)mass participation in performing music, and (3)the connection of the universe with music.

Separately, these three elements are powerful and still found in varying degrees of use throughout the world, but when combined together music becomes a life-changing force – if you’re reading this, that’s something you’ve probably personally experienced.

The uncoupling of movement and music

The uncoupling of dance and music has occurred most obviously in the West and “developed” nations – but to some degree all over the world. This once ubiquitous pairing has undergone a drawn-out divorce where audiences sit still and applause is about as much dancing as you get. At this point, we have dance specialists and musicians and they’re not one and the same. 

Moving our bodies is one dimension in which we experience music and in many ways, culture has tamped this hard-wired impulse down. Sitting still or just toe-tapping goes against the natural instinct to move to a beat. According to research out of Finland, a good beat sends blood to our legs and changes our heart rate and breathing patterns to sync with the music! Participants were also sent into an fMRI machine and happy dance music was played. Researchers found a connection between the auditory cortex to the motor cortex in the brain. Humans are meant to move to music!

How each of us moves to music is not uniform. In fact, more Finish researchers determined the way you move to music is as distinct as your fingerprint. Some of us only bob our heads or tap a foot but we do feel that urge to move. Some of us dance in appropriate venues and some people dance in “inappropriate” places (is there really an inappropriate place to dance?). For some, letting the music move their bodies is as natural as…well as natural as dance is in humans. But for so many people (myself included) moving to music is a foreign concept that was only acted upon when they were young…like really young. I grew up in the United States and I feel like kids stopped moving to music by the age of seven or eight. I had elementary school dances where all my fellow students stood petrified and watched a brave soul or two try to shimmy to the blown-out speakers of some poor DJ. But I digress.

Why is moving to music so scary in some cultures and so commonplace in others? In the West, we have almost completely separated music from dance. At some point, there grew two classes of people – spectators and performers. Kids who happened to have practiced dance might “bust a move” in front of the school at the talent show, but everybody else is in their seats (I’ll deal with participation below). We’re told to sit still. We feel self-conscious at an absurdly young age and don’t want people to ridicule us. I love seeing people dance and I’m envious of how they let the music take over their bodies. I assume you allow yourself the pleasure of “pure music take over” from time to time, but, if you’re like me, it’s a distinct conscious and deliberate action. In his book The Musical Human, Michael Spitzer imagines a dialogue between the West and the Venda (from South Africa) that exemplifies what I trying to say:

“The West: music is a well-defined, separate artistic activity.

The Venda: music is inseparable from singing and dancing!”

A language that doesn’t separate words for dance and music has actually clued into what is the true connections in our brains! A lesson to myself: just get out of the way and let the music move you.

The death of participation

“I don’t play music.” “The only instrument I play is the radio (Spotify).” “I took lessons when I was a kid but I don’t play anymore.” All these are common enough statements that I’m sure most people have either heard or uttered themselves. “What’s so wrong with that?” you may wonder. “Wrong” may be the wrong word but as far as the human experience, it’s a newer trend. Still today, in some cultures, the idea that someone doesn’t play music is absurd. So absurd they may not even know what you mean. To people in these musical cultures, everyone can and does participate in music. Once again the dialogue between the West and Venda is useful here:

“The West: music is a rare talent, tapering into still rarer genius.

The Venda: everyone is musical.

The West: music is enjoyed through passive listening.

The Venda: it is the norm to participate in music, with no distinction made between performer and audience!

The West: the goal of a performance is technical and artistic perfection.

The Venda: the goal is not self-display, but social harmony and well-being!

The West: music is separate from everyday life.

The Venda: music is embedded in life!”

Many of the world’s cultures are not like the Venda and have totally embraced the musician as a specialist as the norm. That means that people are on a stage performing while an audience observes. There’s a distinct line that the audience doesn’t cross.

As I mentioned above about the elementary talent show, at a tender age children are taught to sit and observe while a select few perform. When you grow up in this type of culture, it all seems very normal. But I think participation has been eroding away at an increasing rate primarily due to technology. Why should I listen to my uncle sing when I have on-demand access to an infinite library of superior singers? I’d like to point out, that at most times and places during the existence of humans there have been individuals who are more adept at music-making than others. I’m not making an argument that everybody has the same musical talent or inclination. This is about the slow removal of amateurs performing music from the majority of people’s lives.

Music used to occupy a special place in the home – especially before radios. Amateur musicians were the day-to-day entertainment and means of expression. In some places, music was the primary means of passing on stories and histories.

I’m not sure when it happened but I’ve gotten in the habit of turning down very informal playing opportunities. It wasn’t until I re-realized the power of music that I re-embraced playing in “everyday” situations. Recently, my grandfather had a stroke. I made the trip to see him in the hospital. Luckily, he was able to recognize me and hold a conversation. My uncle had brought a guitar into the hospital room and I was asked to play something. Normally I would have balked and gotten out of it. I looked at my 92-year-old grandfather laying in the bed and I thought, “if not now, then when?” So, I did my best to play him a few songs and it was one of those moments where the power of music just shined like no other form of communication can. He could have cared less what I sounded like, it was the act of participating in music together that was important. I think the expectations (self)imposed on amateur musicians is that they sound like everything on the internet – which is pretty darn fantastic! 

I love that in some of these participation-rich cultures they don’t really have the idea of singing “in tune” or “together”. I think the Venda concept of “the goal is not self-display, but social harmony and well-being!” is a fantastic way to realize music is a collective endeavor. Similarly, BaYaka Pygmies of Cameroon hold a “distributed sense of self, distinct from the individual, bounded self of the modern West.” Participants jump in and out when they please and start on whatever note or word they please. It’s a kind of free polyphony that gives everyone in the group license to just sing (and dance).

All is not bleak for the future of amateur performance! There are still plenty of people who play music for themselves or at intimate gatherings (non-professional) and most importantly, technology that at one stroke aided in decreasing musical participation is at another stroke unleashing a torrent of musical creations in the form of digital content. I don’t think a Youtube video is a substitute for performing but it means that the power of music continues to blossom no matter the time or place.

Music used to tune the universe

The Ancient Egyptians thought the tuning of the lyre was tuning the universe. If a musician played an out-of-tune lyre the world would be thrown off course and the harvest was at stake! That’s some power attributed to music! How literal they took playing out of tune, I don’t know but they certainly took it seriously enough to write down detailed instructions for tuning. Many peoples from across the world and across time believed they were communicating with gods or spirits through music. This line of communication from gods to musicians and musicians back to the gods is one of the reasons music has a mystical quality to it. Musicians are commonly thought to be possessed by otherworldly powers when they perform or create. Music induces trance and access to “the other side”. Because music can align with the universe, creators, and mystical powers of a cultural belief it’s a way for humans to penetrate the physical surroundings and get a glimpse behind the curtain.

Music is always on. We can’t turn it off any more than we can turn off our experiences. Likewise, the universe is always humming, sending vibrations through the atoms of our bodies. Music is the human project of controlling vibrations to elicit experience and understanding of everything greater than and connected to us.

If string theory has elements of ground truth about the universe and the way it is constituted, then music truly is direct manipulation and connection with that vibrating universe.

Maybe this is just a reminder to allow music to be that gateway to that which is bigger than you. Typically, music no longer communicates to the universe because we don’t perform or participate in music except in a more passive way. All is not lost! We can pull movement and participation back into our daily musical lives and let it breathe a connection back between us and the universe.