# The Appeal of Music

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-appeal-of-music/151259>\
**Category:** Great Debates\
**Created:** [January 27, 2003, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-appeal-of-music/151259 "2003-01-27T16:32:08Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![II\_Gyan\_II](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/bbe5ce/32.png) [@II\_Gyan\_II](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/II_Gyan_II)\
**Post date:** [January 30, 2003, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-appeal-of-music/151259/21 "2003-01-30T13:52:34Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by CalMeacham \*  
> \*\*I was very surprised to learn that people with one hemisphere of the brain damaged could no longer speak, but they _could_ sing.  
> \*\*

Does ‘sing’ in this case refer to singing “words” or producing a melodious noise ? If it’s the latter, I can believe it. Losing one hemisphere could possibly mean that the circuit/mechanism that relays to the vocal cords the sound to be produced is damaged whereas voicing random notes could still go on.

One hypothesis I’ve favoured is music emulates and stimulates our natural thought processes. When we “think” something, we take our input , innately take it through a number of steps, and arrive at a conclusion\*. Music emulates that process fundamentally.

\*Conclusion isn’t the same as a resolution. Just a termination of the current process.

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**Author:** ![Puzzle\_Piece](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/fbc32d/32.png) [@Puzzle\_Piece](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Puzzle_Piece)\
**Post date:** [January 30, 2003, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-appeal-of-music/151259/22 "2003-01-30T20:26:20Z")

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This might be slightly off-topic, but I felt I wanted to point out that what you refer to as “music” in this particular discussion is more or less the everyday approach to it as something that has got to be constructed and played on instruments.

This quote, too, was interesting:

> [@](#):
>
> Music is just that order that we find so pleasing. If you open your window, you will hear a cavalcade of sounds, none of which belong with another. It is just noise. But if you take that noise, and order it in such a way that each note builds on the one previous, you now have beauty in sound.

This, of course, is only my own opinion, but I feel that today the whole idea of music and what music is has evolved, in the same way as art no longer is just a sculpture or a painting. What I mean here is the growing number of musicians today that make music that most often is labeled as “experimental/abstract/avant-garde” and whatnot. Noise, field recordings and just generally weird stuff is released on major labels and people can buy this in record stores. I realise of course that what I’m aiming at here is to broaden the general view on what can be referred to as “music” and what is just… sounds.

The point, however, is that this is interesting in the current context because I know that these recordings evoke feelings just like any other music. Maybe you won’t be dancing the night away to Merzbow or Government Alpha, but I still feel I have a point here.

Sorry for being very unclear. Hopefully you’ll make something out of all this.

Cheers

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