After wondering for some time what this week's blog was going to be about, I came across an article from ScienceAlert.com that describes some plausible reasons, from a scientific perspective, why many people get "goose bumps" when they listen to certain types of music. This topic is somewhat similar to several of my previous blog posts, especially my post from February called How to Make Your Music More Emotional. For anyone interested in reading the article, I added a link to it at the end of this blog post. Physiological and emotional reactions to music is a favorite topic of mine, as regular readers surely know by now, so I figured I might as well continue the trend in this blog. Besides, once I came across what seems like a well-written and reputable article on the topic, I got too excited and just had to post an entry about it. So, here goes!
Goose bumps in general
I'm going to try and be brief about this because I don't want to get off on too much of a tangent -- but understanding the actual function of goose bumps involves my cat. Well, really it involves all cats. All you have to do is ask yourself, what does a cat do when it is scared? Its fur stands up on end (as does its tail). This is a naturally-occurring, involuntary biological reaction, and it increases the cat's chances of scaring off a predator. Its back also arches to make it look "taller". When an animal's fur stands up on end, the animal looks bigger, scarier, and more intimidating. It's a product of millions of years of evolution, and for most people this makes pretty good sense.
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| A frightened cat displaying its raised fur. |
For those who are curious, there are plenty of other examples in evolution where a biological feature or phenomenon has become useless and obsolete (our tailbone, men's nipples, to name a few). But I'm not going to get into nipples right now. Surprisingly, I find the topic of music far more interesting.
The "Sneak Attack" in music composition
Before going into how music is connected to goose bumps, I should clarify some differences in the terminology I use versus the terminology used by the authors, editors, and research scientists who are affiliated with ScienceAlert.com. I don't typically like to make up my own words, but I find my terminology to be a lot funner. (That's right, I said it). For instance, the goose bumps that occur when you hear thrilling or beautiful music is the result of something that scientists call "response to unexpected stimuli", while I call it the "Ninja Sneak-Attack". I'm not a scientists, so I get to use much funner words for these concepts, although I am still a passionate advocate for doing your own research and ensuring that you're not just spouting off something that you've "read somewhere". I have to credit some people with their sense of humor, though, because according to this same article a few researchers have used the nickname "skin orgasms" to describe this goose bump effect associated with music, instead of the technical term (which is actually frisson). But whatever you call it, the question remains: why do we get these goose bumps, these "skin orgasms"?
Suppose you are alone, unaware that anybody is around, and someone walks up behind you and scares you. The hair on the back of your neck would probably stand up. This happens for the same reason that I just discussed -- your body goes into "defense mode," because as far as you know it could be something threatening or harmful, like a mountain lion. The key component in this occurrence is that it's unexpected. Researchers hypothesize that many other "unexpected" occurrences can have the same effect. So, when you hear something in a song or a musical piece that "violates" your expectations -- in a good way -- you get goose bumps. Hence, the Sneak-Attack.
I want to provide a few examples of this, but I first want to point out that, from an evolutionary standpoint, the goose bumps resulting from a piece of beautiful music have absolutely no biological function whatsoever. It's just a by-product of evolution that is now outdated. However, the pleasure we feel in our brains when having this experience is perfectly harmless (and, I would argue, healthy) and listening to music in general has been shown to be very therapeutic in many ways. So, goose bumps or not, it's one of many reasons to take advantage of a pleasure that we can access, for no other reason than to enjoy life, and to benefit from these therapeutic effects.
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| Above: The late Oliver Sacks, neurologist and musician, experiencing the joy of listening to one of his favorite pieces. The photo was used as the cover on one of his books, Musicophilia, published in 2007. |
Musical ninjas through the ages
And now to the examples of composers and artists who use this "Sneak-Attack" method. Bach did this constantly. I don't think he called it the Sneak-Attack, but he did it. It's one of the reasons why he is so well-known. From the composer's perspective, the trick is to establish a noticeable pattern, like a theme, a motif, or some sort of catchy melody, and nowadays this is often referred to as part of the "verse." Most listeners will quickly become familiar with this pattern when listening to the song, even if it's subconscious. After establishing this melody, the pattern can be repeated yet again, but this time there is some kind of unexpected change, variation, or subtle difference in the pattern that the listener does not quite expect. It's this element of slight unpredictability in music that stimulates a part of the brain, causing the "surprise," thereby a sense of pleasure, and incidentally produces those goose bumps (although the goose bumps themselves, like I said, serve no real purpose). Bach was known for creating these "surprises" in his melodies, and he was a master at it. His music was enormously popular during his lifetime because of his ability to do this, and to do it incredibly well. The challenging part of creating this effect is that you don't want too much unpredictability, because then it will just sound random and meaningless. On the other hand, if it's too predictable, it may sound boring -- much like a movie that is too predictable, where you already know what's going to happen (take a poorly-written and cliche romantic comedy, for instance). The trick is to find that "happy middle ground" in music, where you have some sort of pattern, yet you introduce just enough unpredictability in certain parts of the song to generate that perfect amount of "surprise".
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| Johann Sebastian Bach |
Other examples where this is done in music:
1. Frederic Chopin does this in Nocturne No. 19 in E minor (video below). There are two notes in the beginning of the verse, and the second note is sustained for a bit (first played at 0:08 in the video), which is played with the right hand, and then there are three notes that follow. This is a simple motif that gets repeated each time the verse starts up again. The fun part of this is that, if you're hearing this piece for the first time, you won't always be able to predict exactly when the verse starts up again. The composer "sneaks" the verse in unexpectedly, or somewhat earlier than expected. This happens at 0:33, 1:36 and 2:04 of the video. One of the ways that Chopin accomplishes this is that he adds other stuff in between the repetitions of the motif, i.e. between 1:08 and 1:35 the song lingers a bit, with basically the same rhythm and tempo (sort of like a "bridge" to a song) and it keeps you guessing as to when, or whether, the verse will repeat again. I like to do this between the bridge and/or climactic part of my songs, and then revisiting a verse towards the end in a more dramatic way (i.e. in a different key or with embellishments). A great way to do that is to re-create part of the motif in the last part of the bridge, and then repeat that motif and sneak the verse in there, creating a subtle transition from the bridge back to the verse. I've done this in many of my songs and people seem to like it. Again, violating a listener's expectations just enough is the key to tickling that musical funny bone.
Speaking of climaxes, Chopin puts one in this song. You may notice that, starting at 1:55, the music gets very dramatic, again creating that feeling of anticipation in the listener to where he or she will not quite be sure when the verse occurs again. Beethoven did this a lot as well. This is a similar effect to a person watching a horror movie and not quite knowing when a creature, monster or "bad guy" is suddenly going to jump out, even though you know it will probably happen at some point. Building anticipation is just another way that these goose bumps form. The Science Alert article discusses this quite thoroughly.
2. Christina Perri does this in her hit song, "Jar of Hearts". She uses a technique called a "chord substitution", where the listener expects to hear a certain chord (based on an established musical pattern in the song) but a different chord is played instead, slightly "surprising" the listener. In the original version (where Christina Perri is singing) the chord substitution is very quick and subtle, partly because she drags her voice a lot and sings over the piano chords with a rather raspy voice, so it's hard to catch. Christina Perri might not even know that she's using this technique in her song because songwriting for many people is far more intuitive, but I notice it because I'm a big nerd who likes to analyze everything. Anyway, there is a piano cover of this song that I absolutely love (below) and you can hear the chord substitution a lot more easily. The chord substitution first happens at 1:01 in the video. Most listeners will expect to hear a major chord because the pianist is already playing in the key of E flat major, and the chord he's using right before 1:01 is A flat major. It changes to a minor chord instead, which a first-time listener will usually not expect. This happens again at 1:14, 2:10, and 2:34.
"Jar of Hearts" by Christina Perri (piano cover)
Below is an excerpt from the lyrics in Christina Perri's original version. I underlined the parts where the chord substitutions take place (from A flat major to A flat minor).
And who do you think you are, running around leaving scars?
Collecting your jar of hearts, and tearing love apart.
You're gonna catch a cold, from the ice inside your soul,
So don't come back to me. Who do you think you are?
3. Whitney Houston does this with the famous key change in the song "I Will Always Love You." The key change in the middle of the song is so effective that now people use it as a parody in comedy films and TV shows, creating a comedic "dramatic" effect whenever someone falls in love or if there is "love at first sight." Key changes in the middle of a song are very popular, and they are tremendously effective; the listener generally does not expect it, and it surprises them, usually to their delight. It sort of "wakes up" the listener. This technique was very popular with 80's and 90's pop music. Michael Bolton was a fan of doing this in his music, and our old friend J.S. Bach did this as well. In Whitney Houston's hit song (below) the key change takes place at around 3:07, following a gap of complete silence (creating a great deal of anticipation), and the original key she was singing in, which was in A major, goes up by a major second, or a "whole step," as some music theory nerds might call it, and the remainder of the song is sung in B major instead.
"I Will Always Love You" by Whitney Houston
4. Ludwig van Beethoven: I mentioned this guy before. Aside from the fact the he (and others, including Bach, Mozart, and a host of other classical composers) used key changes very effectively, he was also very skilled at creating a simple motif and repeating it multiple times throughout a piece, but with an enormous range of variations. A perfect example of this is the first movement of Beethoven's famous 5th Symphony, which boldly begins with four hard-hitting notes: "Ba-ba-ba baaaaaaah!" This motif is often known as the "Fate Motif" because Beethoven apparently described it as "fate knocking at his door". One reason why this piece is so well-known is because you will hear that same exact pattern (the four familiar notes) again and again, throughout the entire song, but with many different variations. Sometimes the variations of the four notes are loud, sometimes they're quiet, sometimes they're played in the melody, sometimes they're played by the cellos in the background, etc., but you hear it again and again. Try listening to it and count how many versions of "Ba-ba-ba baaaaaaah!" you hear throughout the song, and you will run out of fingers. Or, play a drinking game and take a shot every time you hear it; you will be smashed before the piece is over. Beethoven's remarkable use of variations in this simple motif is one of the ways you can keep the listener "guessing" and, again, get those goose bumps on your arms.
Just an FYI, there is an on-going written commentary about the music in this particular YouTube video, obviously created by some big nerd like myself. For the sake of simply listening to the piece and noticing the variations I discussed, the written commentary in the video can be ignored (especially since it changes so rapidly) unless you really want to read it.
That being said, there is no better example to end on than Beethoven's famous masterpiece. But seriously, be careful if you try that drinking game, because you really will be two sheets to the wind by the time you're done. ;)
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