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There is no question that different music has different effects. Playing Mozart, according to French researcher Mme. Belanger, "coordinates breathing, cardiovasular rhythm, and brain-wave rhythm and leads to to positive effects on health. It acts on the unconscious, stimulating receptivity and perception." In a now famous experiment, subjects were asked to extend their right arm horizontally. Their resistance to downward pressure was measured. The students then relaxed and the experiment was repeated after half an hour but this time rock music (Led Zeppelin) was played. The resistance of every single student was measurably weakened! Classical music was tested but found to have either a neutral or strengthening effect. You can try it yourself. Anyone still skeptical about the physical property of music should talk to a professional rock musician. The reason rock, which uses a lot of loud and heavy bass guitar, is thought to be sexual, is because it vibrates at a specific frequency which literally vibrates in our loins. Rock seems sexy because it is physically sexual.
Mendelssohn once said, "music cannot be expressed in words, not because it is vague but because it is more precise than words." If a single note during the Jenny experiments can haver such a beautiful (and dramatic) effect, it is hardly surprising that a musical piece that is specifically constructed to be harmonious should have a physically harmonious effect in our minds and bodies. It apprears that the baroque composers, attempting to create an ideal mathmatical form and harmony in their music, managed to produce exactly the right frequency and sound to harmonize the functioning of the brain and produce a state of calm, relaxed alertness. This is why so much emphasis in the development of Lazanov's technique has been placed on baroque music, largely composed in the period 1700-1750. Baroque and classical composers tended to employ a constant theme, and they aimed for symmetry or pattern throughout their work. The main key was established clearly at the beginning of the composition. The first and last movements would be in the tonic key and the slow movement was in a key with a very close relationship to tonic. It was a primary aim of baroque composers to use music to create a specific unifying mood and to biberate the mind from earthly concerns. Baroque thereby shares a common aim with certain Indian works, which were also written to create a specifically mediative state. Baroque music is also characterized by contrasts--contrasts between instruments, bright versus dark sounds. The contrasts continue between movements--fast/slow/fast--and between the upper (treble) melody and lower, deeper (bass) was to produce a single harmonious and unified effect. The violin, considered to be the expressive instrumental counterpoint to the human voice, featured widely in baroque music, and the continuous base was often the harpsichord plus cello or bassoon. The rhythm of baroque music is unusually precise.
Generally speaking, the music accompanying our own Accelerated Learning language dialogues features a clearly recognizable melody in the violin or string section, with a steady bass accompaniment to a specific rhythm of 60 beats per minute. We have favored composers such as Handel, Vivaldi, Bach, Corelli, and Telemann. The effect is to produce a sense of well-being and relaxxed receptivity. Each concert session is brought to a refreshing and stimulating conclusion with a bright joyful sound, often a flute piece in a major key.
Educational theorist Stephen Cooter monitored his brain-wave patterns on an ECG biofeedback machine, while listening to the music recommended for the active concert. He found a "balanced" and complete brain-wave configuartion as follows: Although the above charts are not exactly to scale, the music had a very measurable effect in increasing the proportion of alpha and theta brain waves. Studying the effect in detail, Cooter noted "that largo movements produced a sleepy theta-dominant brain rhythm. When whole classical compositions are used, a more balanced and complete brain-wave configuration is produced: roughly equal alpha (alert), twilight (relaxed), and beta (critical alert) rhythms are present." We cannot help noting in passing that the characteristic shift in the electromagnetic frequency of brain rhythm which this specific baroque music produces is toward 7.5 cycles per second. That is alpha. Also 7.5 cycles per second is the exact frequency at which the ionoshphere resonates. So the ionosphere, that vacuum layer in the earth's upper atmosphere, which reflects all our radio and TV communications, happens to resonate at the precise frequency of the key note of Pythagoras' music of the spheres. This 7.5 cps frequency, known as the Schumman Resonance, is also that of the human mind in a meditative state. Says physicist Robert Beck, contemplating the Schumman Resonance, "The earth itself has a brain-wave. There is no longer any question that man is a biocosmic resonator."
Let us tune in!
Listening to relaxation music, new age music, music for meditation etc. has a simular affect on the brain & mood.
from - Accelerated Learning by Colin Rose,