Today's topic, Music. I love music, it really can sooth the savage breast (William Congreve).  It can move us to love and tears, anxiety and calm.  It can move us to, well, move our bodies and our thoughts. 

I almost always have a song playing in my head.  I thought everyone did, but found out that isn't so.  I did a little research and found that having music in the head can be a sign of depression, which depressed me to find out.  However, it can mean other things too.  Some call it auditory hallucinations, some Musical Ear Syndrome.  Thank goodness the research shows that hearing music doesn't mean you aren't lucid or that you are crazy.  Did you hear that?  It doesn't make me crazy.  Yay!  I am told it can also mean you are an auditory learner, that your brain is just filling in gaps so it isn't idle. Some suggest that you can be healed/treated.  Hearing music is associated with being hard of hearing, elderly, depressed, tinnitus and lack of auditory stimulation.  There is some research and a theory that we will see more people with music in their heads related to availability of music. 

I have my own theory.  I think that music is ingrained in my feelings, thinking and emotions so I hear music because it is part of my makeup. I find music soothing, comforting, stimulating etc, but mostly I find it pleasurable.  The music that plays in my head is usually just a random song I know.  It can be related to a word, phrase or situation.  Usually, if I hear a good song in the morning I can pull it up and listen to it at intervals all day.  I sometimes get songs stuck, oh, that is frustrating.  It is hard to change the song when you have one stuck.  Once, a few years ago I had just a few bars of a song stuck in my head.  It would play over and over and over.  I couldn't remember the song just those few bars and it played and played and I was so on edge all the time because I couldn't name it and get it out of my head.  Finally, one day out of the blue (I actually may have heard it on the radio)  I realized what song it was, and the tension went away, I was able to relax. The song, Madman Across the Water, by Elton John.  The first bars of the song played over and over and over....No jokes about the title, please, but really it was driving me mad.  

I call having music in my head, my own personal ipod.  I hear music and if I get tired of one song I change it out for another.  If you think about it I also can see the theory about music being available having even more credence.  TV, movies, theater, elevators, phones etc all have sound tracks in one form or another. Is it a surprise that my brain creates it's own?

 I will say I don't like Country music.  I find it the bastard child of Gospel and Blue Grass. When I go into places that play Country I literally have to find a happy place so it doesn't rot my brain.  I have to tune it out. I tell people that there are studies showing Country music lowers your IQ.  I sometimes get takers, usually from Country music fans.  So, maybe it does lower the IQ.

When I am out in public, driving in my car I have to listen to music I find non irritating.  That can vary.  One day I may enjoy a song I have heard many times and another I may be so over hearing that song.  It depends on my mood.  When I hear music that gets on my nerves, I have to do something, change the station, request it be changed or work on tuning it out.  Music that irritates makes me I feel like I could jump out of my skin, literally. 

I am a good Christian woman and love hymns. Some of my favorites, I Need Thee Every Hour,  Be Still My Soul,  How Firm a Foundation, The Spirit of God, and Redeemer of Israel, I Stand All Amazed. There are others of course but I really like these.  I do not like Christian Rock.  I will be singing hymns or go to Hell music and that is about it.  My rock and roll is what is it is as are my hymns.  I don't need goof ball losers trying to marry the two.   

I like old music, I like new music.  I can tell I am getting old though.  I can't stand some of what the kids are listening to today.  So much of it has a hideous dance beat in the background.  YUCK.  Just sing me a song already.  No crappy beat. 

I like Classical, Big Band, and about every era in the Rock and Roll genre.  I am picky though. Some songs just don't do it for me.  There will be "monster hits" that I cannot stand and ones that never get much play that I love.  Electric Avenue, by Eddie Grant, hate it.  Romeo's Tune, by Steve Forbert, love it.

So, to recap, I am not crazy, I love music and it is normal and OK to hear music in my head.  Oh, and I am not crazy.  I hope that I am not the only one with music in my head all the time.  It can make for a more pleasant and peaceful life.