lsellers5@una.edu

Everybody loves music, but I think it’s the absolute best. We all have our favorite artists, genres, and songs. The best part is that our music varies just as much as we do as people. Music can range from calm folk songs about peace and love to raging metal lashing out against any and every wrong in the world. 

One of the coolest parts of music is that it is one of the largest and most easily perceived ways of self-expression we as people have, and it’s always been that way. Music is so much a part of who we are that it’s older than civilization itself. For example, archaeologists have found the remains of musical instruments dating as far back as 60,000 years ago, about 56,000 years before we figured out how to write, give or take a few hundred years.

So what makes music such a great form of self-expression? It is very digestible, it’s easy to get across your point about how sad you are when your music is low and slow with negative words in the lyrics if lyrics are even needed to do so. Also, the presence of specific emotional tones in music allows it to cross language barriers in a way few other art forms can. English doesn’t have to be your native language for you to be able to tell that “Cry” by Cigarettes After Sex is probably not a very happy-go-lucky song. (Go listen if you haven’t it’s a great song)

Music also not only has the power to express emotions, but invoke them in us regardless of if we’ve actually been through what the artist has or not. Music can stir our emotions to a million different ends. It can do everything from making us feel better about a breakup like in the band Passenger’s “Let Her Go” which helped me through the absolutely soul-crushing event of my Middle School girlfriend leaving me when I was 13. All the way to songs like  “X gon’ give it to ya” or “Master of Puppets” that make you feel hyped enough to run through a wall.

Music is the best storytelling device humanity ever came up with. Putting words to song and singing of everything from tender love, to cruel bloodshed. The proud triumphs and the humbling defeats of life are no better described and felt than they are in song. From the proud and ancient folk traditions of countless cultures. To the modern stories told by rappers, pop artists, and country singers in America and beyond.

Music is also one of the most widespread avenues for social change. Largely due to the qualities I just listed music has been used as a form of rebellion or protest for 1000’s of years. Encompassing songs by artists such as Bob Dylan, CCR, and Green Day that are still popular today, all the way to songs protesting tyrannical monarchs in the 18th and 17th centuries that have been almost completely forgotten. These songs have all inspired change in their respective societies despite their stylistic differences. 

Finally, one of my favorite qualities of music is that, unlike many other art forms, you don’t have to create it to be a part of it and fully appreciate it. You can have never played an instrument or sung anywhere but your shower and still fully appreciate music for what it is.

All in all, music is my favorite art form. Without it, I wouldn’t be who I am, and society wouldn’t be what it is. Next time you turn on Sabrina Carpenter, Slipknot, or anybody. Think about it a little more and you’ll realize, music is even cooler than you thought.