Music is medicine.
One good thing that I can say about the Coronavirus pandemic is that it gave us livestream concerts, prematurely dropped EPs, and more accessible content than we deserved. It felt like every week, the artists who are young enough to know how to post on Instagram were showering us with raw recordings and secret albums they’d produced in their dimly lit home studios and it was A TREAT.
Music has acted like a saving grace amidst the stress of this period of history. In the surge of civil unrest, music feels like a language we all know how to speak.
Whether you stormed your nearest Wal-Mart to load up on massive quantities of toilet paper or your only news intake came from eavesdropping on the guy in front of you in line at Trader Joes, you’ve definitely bounced your shoulders to “Can’t Stop the Feeling” by JT.
No matter what side of the political aisle you take your seat on, the chocolatey bass intro to “My Girl” by The Temptations for sure melts the tension in your face into a nostalgic smile.
And, I’ve been to enough weddings to know that “September” by Earth, Wind, and Fire gets both your drunk 22-year-old cousin and her senile great aunt out of their chairs and onto the dance floor.
My point—music is a wondrous collective connector, soother, and friend. Why has putting words to sound to rhythm to melody been so powerful for all humans for all of time?
I don’t know.
The global pandemic put a hold on live concerts, worship gatherings, and so much more, but I still have instruments at home and a voice in my chest and multiple platforms to enjoy the gift of music and that is a big, fat relief.
In a period of history where the differences that divide us seem to be the only things we can see; it’s comforting to know that there are still timeless joys of life that universally connect us.
As of late, I’ve been inspired to practice no longer treating music like noise—asking it to fill in the gaps of silence in my day because I’m afraid of the quiet. In the car, if I don’t feel like I can really consume music in an honorable way, by really listening or belting it out, then I’ll drive in silence. If the house is quiet and it’s bugging me, I won’t ask a song to act as a buffer because music has been there for me like a soothing balm, an anchor, an invitation into dancing, a medicine for life’s bumps and bruises.
Like any medicine, I don’t want to abuse it.