What does music mean to you?

[Dreamer]

Music to me is beautiful. I often visualize a song in my mind in some abstract way filled with shapes, color, and vibrancy. I don't have synesthesia, but when I hear an inspiring piece, the various elements of the song dance in this black space, with texture and weight. They overlap, they are transparent, they resonate with a meaning to each their own. I don't only see music as this nebulous, sort of cataclysmic event of shapes in my mind, but also of a very structured and ordered arrangement of sequences and notes. The best way I can describe music's intoxicating affect on me, is to picture a music visualizer in your media player. Sure it can look randomized, but it adheres to a logic, a code, an algorithmic expression. The difference is, this "visualizer" is all my own, and doesn't take the shape or form of any I've seen, and is not the same produced for just any song. Each and every song I enjoy, or that brings meaning to me, casts its own individual expression. If I ever lost my ability to hear, that would sincerely be the death of me as it gives me another way to see the world.

This is how I "see" music. I am really curious how others see, experience, or feel music on a personal level, whether they play it or just listen to it. It's undeniable music is one of man's greatest expressions. Let's talk about it!

 

[HongDou]

Music is everything to me. I don't think I'd be who I am today without music, and there would be a lot about myself I wouldn't even know if it weren't for music.

Music is one of the biggest keys to my soul.

 

[uumlau]

I've loved music all my life. When I was a kid, I was enchanted by certain things I heard, and disappointed when I couldn't hear them again. For instance, I was really disappointed when they changed the theme of Lassie from Greensleeves to some other music. (Yes, I'm dating myself.)

I had 9 years of piano lessons as a kid, from 9 until 18. I played improv piano for a dance class in college. Well into middle age, I'd just play music and compose simple things, for my own enjoyment. Then I discovered dancing and salsa music, and it was like discovering music all over again.

 

[SearchingforPeace]

I love music. It is a short cut past ego to get to the real me. I don't see all the things you describe....I just feel......gloriously.

I did 5 years of piano lessons, 3 years of clarinet. I was never good (no Si hurt, I guess). But I loved listening. It just cuts deep in my heart and I feel something great.

I loved dancing and was naturally good at it, feeling the music, though not in rigid patterns.

For several years we stopped listening to music because our autistic sons couldn't handle it. Eventually, I started again a few years ago and it felt so good. It was like in had been missing a part of me. It just pulled me forward.

My wife has only started listening again recently and it greatly improves her mood.

 

[GarrotTheThief]

everything.

 

[Chrysanthe]

a collection of sounds and noises which alters my mind to match a certain mood or headspace.

 

[Qlip]

I've never been a particularly emotional listener, sad songs generally don't make me sad and happy songs generally don't make me mad. But music does connect me to a feeling, an aesthetic feeling. I don't think it's the same as emotion. The feeling, the vibration, transmits intention, context, various geists that ride it. It conducts my mind. I suppose music means whatever any art means.

 

[Dreamer]

I love music. It is a short cut past ego to get to the real me. I don't see all the things you describe....I just feel......gloriously.

I did 5 years of piano lessons, 3 years of clarinet. I was never good (no Si hurt, I guess). But I loved listening. It just cuts deep in my heart and I feel something great.

I loved dancing and was naturally good at it, feeling the music, though not in rigid patterns.

For several years we stopped listening to music because our autistic sons couldn't handle it. Eventually, I started again a few years ago and it felt so good. It was like in had been missing a part of me. It just pulled me forward.

My wife has only started listening again recently and it greatly improves her mood.

I'm sort of teaching myself piano here and there when I get a chance now, but I grew up playing the violin. I love it all!

I'm no dancer but I absolutely love going to the ballet or seeing any other interpretative dance. There is something also just so satisfying when you watch a performance where the music and choreography just line up so beautifully too. Not like I am any sort of credible judge of dance, but there is just something that seems to "click" or seem right when you see dance and music unite in a performance so perfectly. More often though, I'll see some dance performance and will instead feel I am watching some dance routine with music in the background, but no unified expression of the two.

 

[Dreamer]

I've never been a particularly emotional listener, sad songs generally don't make me sad and happy songs generally don't make me mad. But music does connect me to a feeling, an aesthetic feeling. I don't think it's the same as emotion. The feeling, the vibration, transmits intention, context, various geists that ride it. It conducts my mind. I suppose music means whatever any art means.

If I think about it, I feel I'm similar in that music itself doesn't necessarily alter my mood. However, I can say with certainty that it enhances whatever mood I am already in. Usually if I am feeling depressed or happy, or whatever, I will play music that matches that mood to allow myself to fully experience those emotions. One thing that I find music can do though, is get me into a creative mindset almost immediately. (If listening to the right music of course)

 

[SearchingforPeace]

I'm sort of teaching myself piano here and there when I get a chance now, but I grew up playing the violin. I love it all!

I'm no dancer but I absolutely love going to the ballet or seeing any other interpretative dance. There is something also just so satisfying when you watch a performance where the music and choreography just line up so beautifully too. Not like I am any sort of credible judge of dance, but there is just something that seems to "click" or seem right when you see dance and music unite in a performance so perfectly. More often though, I'll see some dance performance and will instead feel I am watching some dance routine with music in the background, but no unified expression of the two.

Yes. Very sad. But so glorious when it combines into one great thing.

 

[evilrubberduckie]

Not being bored driving in the car, White Noise, Something to do, something to listen to, sometimes poetry, Nostalgia...

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

Music is one thing that can reallly break through my walls in a way that a lot of visual art can't.