A great deal of music – particularly Indian ragas – are expressive of emotion. We know that emotion is a pleasant or unpleasant mental state organized in the limbic system of the mammalian brain. Specifically, these states are manifestations of non-verbally expressed feelings, which include fear, dislike, disgust, shame, sadness, surprise, anger, joy, etc. The study of emotions, originally a part of psychology, has in recent years come to be associated with neuroscience, and in studies relating to artificial intelligence.
Etymologically, the word emotion is a composite formed from two Latin words. ex/ out, outward + motio/movement, action, gesture. So, any emotion involves a movement, physical or mental. Music, which represents movement in time, has tremendous potentiality to express emotion, offers avenues for expression, which cannot otherwise be expressed due to the constraints of a language or social norms. However, according to Eduard Hanslick, music cannot ‘represent’ emotion – since it lacks the conceptual means either to designate the object of any emotion or to express a thought about such an object. What transforms indefinite feelings into definite emotion, Hanslick concludes, is judgement.
Music expresses emotion in virtue of exhibiting features which are identifiable with human gestures (including vocal gestures), which go to express emotion.
It has been found that the body responds to emotions variously: fear and anger, by an increased muscle tension and heightened heartbeat; happiness as a sensation of lightness or buoyancy; sadness by a feeling of tightness in the throat; desire by a dry throat and heavy breathing, etc.
There is no denial of the fact that Indian ragas are highly expressive of imaginary emotion, which in recent years is attracting the attention of music therapists, who have to select appropriate ragas for the problems faced by mankind in terms of stress in everyday life and the growing mechanization of lifestyles, carved out by the criterion of money.
While in normal life, emotions could be undesired to the individual feeling them, who may wish to control, but often really cannot. For a music therapist, emotion comes handy as a much-desired thing.
It is now recognized that emotion as the subject of scientific research has multiple dimensions: behavioural, physiological, subjective, and cognitive. Thus, it is the emotional spectrum in a raga system which could be said to be a spectrum in a raga system which could be said to be of great importance in bringing out the desired change in a patient undergoing music therapy sessions.
The recent research on the neural circuitry of emotion suggests that emotion plays a crucial role in management decision-making, including long-term planning. Sloman and others explain that the need to face a changing and unpredictable world makes emotions necessary for any intelligent system (natural ·or artificial) with multiple motives and limited capacities and resources.
Between emotion and reason, in several situations it has been noted by many that passion, emotion, or feeling add great strength to an argument, which is totally based on reason – particularly if ideological or religious sentiments interfere.
Thus, a rational mind can be overpowered with belief and perhaps the Indian ragas with their emotional spectrum can re-install the desired emotions in the minds of their listeners – inculcating a sort of ‘get well’ belief.
According to the theory of the human control system propounded by William Glaiser, behaviour is composed of four simultaneous components: deed, ideas, emotions and physiological state. He asserts that we choose the idea and deed and that the associated emotions and physiological states also occur, but cannot be chosen independently. However, by inculcating musical ragas as a part of one’s lifestyle, we can bring in the desired emotions (e.g. joy) as a driving force in changing not only the physiological components, but also in shaping up the required changes and ideas.
How Emotions in Music could be helpful?
Emotions are mammalian elaborations of vertebrate arousal patterns, in which neurochemicals (dopamine, noradrenaline, and serotonin) step-up or step-down the brain activity as visible in body movements, gestures and postures. The physiological links that exist between emotion (e.g., feel-good factors in music) and neurochemicals are currently attracting the attention of the scientific community.
This article was published in My Doctor March 2007 – Pages 24 and 25 under the section Alternative Medicine.
Edited by Geeta Shreedar, July 8, 2021