Your taste in music

You tune in for Flash-Back weekend on the radio. Your friends listen to head-banger Heavy Metal. Your online buddy listens to Brazilian music. You haven’t quite figured out why your brother-in-law likes Country music; and lest we not forget Grandpa and his Big Band era, old crony music.

There are as many genres of music as there are days of the year. There’s an audience for every single type of music. The categories are as spread out as the east is from the west. Someone is spending their paycheck from McDonald’s buying the latest Rap CD and someone else just picked up a copy of Madame Butterfly. Why is it that no matter what type of music is being made, or has been around for decades upon decades, there are still audiences to listen?

Identity. People listen and purchase particular genres of music because they identify with it on some level. For some, it’s all about the lyrics. Whether a sappy love song or a goofy Weird Al Yankovic’s original, the listener feels the pain or is busting a gut laughing at the humor written about in the song. Some genres are merely mood setters. Jazz, Classical, Latin and Brazilian music all conjures up a certain romantic or relaxing mood. Whereas if you’re getting ready to go on a date or go to work, pop in some ‘pump up the volume’ jams, and do your best Risky Business impression and let the music crank up your adrenalin.

Each different genre serves a very specific sensory purpose. Sometimes it’s merely background music so that you can study or think about important matters. Other times it’s to reminisce about a lost love. There’s a reason you joined Columbia and BMG music club so you could order every single cassette tape available by that artist and then play them over and over. Your aunt loves to listen to the Kingston Trio because it reminds her of the days back in Chicago when she was growing up; to a time of a much simpler lifestyle.

Come on, admit it, every time you hear Shannon’s ‘Let the Music Play’ it puts you back to 1985. You remember all the fun (and trouble) you got into and for three minutes you escape to your happy place. You remember being in the military hospital listening to Barry Manilow. You are sporting gray hair and a Friar Tuck hair doo, yet you still love listening to AC/DC and Skynard. Why? Because those where the best years of your life – listening to those guys on your walkman.

We like the music; but more so we like what it means to us. We like the memories it awakens. So the next time you look at someone and ponder how in the world they could listen to THAT? Don’t focus on the noise, but rather, know the listener has an appreciation for it because of something much deeper – the emotions it brings with it.

Your taste in music

(with permission from ArticleGoRound)

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