MUSIC AND IDENTITY

Popular Music Constructs Identity

Popular Music Constructs Identity

Introduction

Music is called as a language that expresses the number of emotions and gestures. Musicians communicate with others through songs, and it is assumed that this communication medium is more effective than others. Every melody tells a different story with a different mood which can be easily understood by a person of that caliber. Music can also help in changing the pre-existing mood of a person. The music is a great benchmark for us to identify humans, widely particularly in societies and in person. Each person geographically, historically, socially and psychologically has its musical background which is strongly linked to its character and / or personality. This paper discusses how the music influences and constructs the identity of an individual, specifically the influence of rock & roll and classical music on the identity of an individual.

Influence of Music

Music is conspicuously a part of our lives at all grades, if individual, communal, or even national. The American public is evidently made cognizant of music through TV, wireless, recordings, reside, live performances, and backdrop music. It is commonly utilized to convey persons simultaneously and assist to articulate heritage persona, human compassion, and individual goals and aspirations. It communicates feeling and strong feeling, and the mind-set held by its creative individual as well as all of its listeners. Since decades music has been considered as a part of our lives and numbers of theorists say that music does influence us (Rentfrow et al, 2009, 329). If we see, we all listen to music, but it is not at all necessary that we all like the same melody or a song. This difference in song choice can be due to mood tantrum or a music taste. Researchers say that selection of a song tells the current mood of a person in particular and in general the personality of a person. Music does influence in shaping the personality of a person.

Although there are many ways to express psycho-socio-cultural identification, the music is the one that involves all of us. Along with language, this art (it requires skill) and cultural (it is part of our way of life) is one of the only mechanisms that, apart from appearing only in humans, it develops phenotype in our genes, and it is activated by the interaction and is particularly noticeable. The music has its greatest influence during adolescence, when a person seeks to define the personality to be in his adult stage. Because of this, human beings are, by nature, musical beings and so, as suggested by Dr. Stefan Koelsch, a neuroscientist at the Max-Planck Institute of Germany, who in a study with his team, concluded that the human brain has developed a strong pitch for receiving and producing music, not because of music education regardless of the individual or if he is very interested in music. "We see in our experiments that people, that their selves are considered very musical and have never played an instrument, are able to process ...