It expresses our deepest feelings of love, grief, congratulations, and best wishes. As background music, its soothing sound accompanies us on the elevator, in the workplace and in the department store. Indeed, an entire new industry was born to provide music designed to help increase sales and improve work efficiency. The first company to develop and provide such music was called Muzak. Music ranges in quality, tone, and style, from a Beethoven symphony to an Elvis Presley love song.
Teenagers play it on boom boxes at volume levels high enough to challenge our sanity.
And in the nursery, the new mom selects a lullaby as background music to help her baby sleep. It is no wonder then, that music is used in medicine for its therapeutic value. It is used to promote healing, reduce stress and anxiety, and promote an overall sense of well-being. Music can be an active or passive therapy. That is, it has great therapeutic value when we simply sit and listen to it, or when we participate actively in its production.