Let me tell you a fascinating story that highlights the power of music as a universal language. In 1984, a group of around 3,000 white beluga whales were trapped in the Senyavin Strait in Siberia. The whales were struggling to find their way back to the open ocean, and their survival was in jeopardy.
Fortunately, the Russian icebreaker Moskva arrived on the scene to rescue the stranded whales. The crew tried various methods to guide the belugas back to safety, including using sounds and even explosives to create an opening in the ice. However, the whales remained stuck.
Finally, the crew hit upon an idea: they began playing music over the ship’s speakers in an attempt to calm the whales and guide them to safety. They tried all sorts of music, including pop, rock, and folk, but to no avail. Then, they played classical music – and to their amazement, the whales immediately began following the ship to safety.
This incredible incident highlights the mysterious power of music as a universal language. Despite the fact that whales and humans communicate in completely different ways, the belugas were able to respond to the emotional and aesthetic qualities of classical music, and follow the icebreaker to safety. It seems that music has the power to transcend language and species barriers, and connect us all on a deep emotional level.
Here’s an excerpt from a news article about this event:
“IN one of the more unusual rescue operations in the history of Arctic navigation, a Soviet icebreaker rammed a 15-mile path through thick ice last month to free thousands of trapped white beluga whales.
“The saga of the whales, known in Russia as belukhas or polar dolphins, made for some of the winter’s more suspenseful reading as the icebreaker Moskva raced against time and plunging temperatures to reach the whales before they suffocated or starved in shrinking pools of open water. Like other seafaring mammals, Belugas must rise to the surface to breathe.” [source]
Why did the whales respond as they did?
Another experiment had similar incredible results. A high school student named David Merrill in Suffolk, VA conducted an experiment to test the effects of music on mice. He divided 72 mice into three groups, one that listened to no music, another that listened to heavy metal legends Anthrax for 10 hours a day, and a third that listened to the classical genius Mozart for the same amount of time.
Then, he put all of the mice in a maze to see how long it would take them to complete it. At first, it took the mice from all three groups an average of 10 minutes to finish the maze. However, as time went on, the control group (no music) mice improved to about five minutes, while the Anthrax mice took a whopping half an hour to complete the maze and became extremely aggressive toward each other.
The most incredible result was seen in the group of mice that listened to Mozart. They improved drastically, finishing the maze in just under two minutes on average. Not only did they become faster and more efficient, but they also appeared calmer and less aggressive than the other mice.
As a seasoned musician, this result did not come as a surprise to me. But think about it – these little mice, with their tiny brains and different physiological makeup, were able to respond to the emotional and intellectual nuances of Mozart’s music in a way that directly impacted their cognitive and behavioral abilities. It’s a testament to the power of music to transcend language, species, and even size barriers, and to tap into something deep and fundamental within us all.
Here are the conclusions from the experiment:
“David concluded from the experiment, that ‘music does indeed have an effect on the learning abilities of white male mice. Classical music has a very positive effect on their learning abilities, whereas, the hard rock music has an even greater negative effect on their learning abilities.’
“‘Aside from the facts which I have been able to show you today, I can say, from my own view and my own opinion, from observing the mice, that it seemed not only to affect their ability to learn, but their ability to cope, one with another.’ This was reflected even after the experiment was over, David reported.
“‘After the second year of doing this project–as I said, I kept them separate this year, to try to eliminate the fighting–I would take all the mice to a local pet store, just to get rid of them, and give them away. And, when I did this with the Classical and the Control mice, one group at a time, I would put them into two aquariums, and take them away. That’s 24 mice in 20 gallons. I thought that wasn’t that bad, and it wasn’t, for the Classical and the Control. They were fine with one another.
“‘However, when I put the Hard Rock mice in there, within an hour, they had just begun fighting so severely, that I had to separate all the mice. And, I gave them about a week just to ‘chill out,’ I guess you could say, and sort of calm down, because I guess the music had made them so uptight, and had been putting such bad messages into them, that they couldn’t handle one another. So I gave them about a week, just to calm down and settle down. I actually played a little Classical music to them, to see if it would reverse the effects.’
“Even a week later, he reported, the Hard Rock group was still fighting, but he managed to get them to the store alive.
“‘It’s been an interesting project,’ David concluded, ‘and I’ve enjoyed doing it, and I’ve enjoyed the results I found, as well as the research I’ve done. It’s too bad that it’s not a subject that is widely publicized, as widely as it should be, because I found multiple areas of research, which are extremely significant, whether it’s how great the effects of Classical music are on pre-schoolers learning their ABCs, or whether it’s just the bad morals in the hard rock music.
“‘Something very interesting is that these mice could not understand the lyrics, but the music alone was bad enough, much less the lyrics, which the people are subjected to, but the mice weren’t. And, that’s something that I think is pretty significant as well.'” [source]
How does all of this work? Why does it happen? In what ways can music affect us?
Luckily, there is someone who can explain how all of this works: Dr. Michael Ballam. He gave a couple of talks on this topic, available on youtube:
The Power of Music to Lift and Teach – Michael Ballam, August 17, 1998 during BYU Education Week.
The Healing Power of Music – Michael Ballam, August 16, 1999 during BYU Education Week.
Dr. Ballam also has a CD set on this topic, called “Music and the Mind.” He also did a follow-up called “More Music and the Mind.” If you find the above presentations interesting, I would very highly recommend that you purchase these two sets. They go into great detail on how music affects our minds.
Additionally, for those interested in reading more on the subject, take a look at a book called “The Mozart Effect” by Don Campbell.