If we have to understand music, it is necessary for us to discuss the subject of music objectively, dispassionately and try to understand it for what it is before we go ahead to either praise or criticize it. When someone listens to music from a radio, television or a DVD played to him, it is certain to bring about a reaction to him. If the song played on these devices has a catchy tune to it then it is normal for the person who has taken a liking to it, get up and feel the urge to dance, keeping with the rhythm of the musical instrument and drum beats. If it was a song, which we have fancied from our childhood, then it touches the deepest cords of your memory and pulls at the strings of your heart. Then, the feeling produced by the music appears to envelop you, and it triggers up multiple responses in a group of people, especially if the song and the accompanying orchestra can release our hidden emotions, which grip the person listening to it - a feeling that is irresistible - and appears to us from no where. You cannot precisely pin point what caused you to behave the way you did when the song was played to you, but the fact remains that it has appealed to the core of your heart and has now molded by your emotions and personality. So, in the first instance itself, we can come to the conclusion that music has a mind-altering property to it, which affects our behavior!

To support our theory from facts, we must unemotionally see whether there is a relationship between the type of songs that we listen to, and our emotional physical responses to it when it is played. The musician who is belting out the song clearly has a motive in mind. He does not sing nonsensical verses for they will not rake him money from the market. He should correctly gauge the responses of the audiences that he has in his mind, and sing it in a way, which is bound to affect the listener. The songs can be classified into different categories: some of them are happy, others sad, which brings out the best or worst in us. Although, the musician is playing a song, which he has composed, keeping the words in tune with the lyrics that have been written for it, the music will have a certain effect on us. It will silence us into a period of deep meditation as we hang on to every word, which is blaring out from our DVD, and we start relating to his feelings expressed in the song with its underlying mood, and for reasons we cannot understand, start identifying ourselves with that song, which would be mood elevating for it makes us happy or a song that is sung in a soulful way that leaves us with a feeling of depression that we start identifying with our own traumas as we pass through the ups and downs of the daily life; and perhaps resign ourselves that there is no cure to the malady, which the expert musician with his accompanying orchestra have conveyed to us peeping into the very depths of our souls.

Now, if a person is of a sensitive nature, pessimistic and with a melancholic bent of mind, he plays the song over and over again until it has a complete grip over his soul. He tries to drown in his sadness by drinking pegs of alcohol only to find that they have created a suicidal tendency in him that life is not worth living, his struggles, while living his life appears as useless to him, and may think on the lines of attempting suicide or worse still commit the act in a moment of passion with the song playing in the background with added effect as a fitting finale for his departure from his earth. Again, these cases are few and far between; nevertheless, they influence our innermost private thoughts, which we cannot share with anybody – except the singer whose melodious voice filled with sadness and pathos – who has released us from our prison, which is encasing his soul into the willing arms of death. Again, we can say for sure that music can be destructive in weaning away a person from the realities of life and putting him on the path of escapism, where he starts believing that the troubles, which he is facing are not his own and they belong to someone else: and at the other end of the scale, he may be driven to extremes, ready to part his life for a few verses, which have touched an emotional cord in him taking him into the netherworld from where there are no comebacks!

Today, we come across all types of music, which are suited and tailor-made to the needs of person, in such a way to manipulate our moods, reduce stress and reduce a person's boredom from the humdrum of his daily life that he escapes into a world of fantasy. And, once he snaps out of his reverie, the same troubles plague him either in his professional or personal life and sometimes both. Music is played today for a variety of reasons as an outlet for emotional expression, enable mood change for a short period of time, to facilitate relaxation or provide the necessary impetus to stimulate an athlete in outperforming himself – but fails when there is no music played in the background during the final event – facilitate momentary relaxation from our mortgage bills and provide him a source of comfort and solace in this cut throat competitive world. The musclemen who work for the bank do not share his refined tastes in music are back at his door and demand that he makes good the backlog of his mortgage payments, which are long overdue to the bank or face a civil suit armed against a battery of lawyers. And, sometimes to soften him into submission give him a thrashing that brings him back into a towering rage to face the harsh, unsympathetic world, which is not swayed by emotion and songs – a place – where money talks to get you out of all types of dangerous situations. So, at best, music perhaps offers a temporary respite and not a universal remedy for the cure of all evils. Again, we wish to stress the fact that music has mind-altering properties, some of them, which are permanent, whereas, others are temporary. The effects of alcohol accompanied by music are more dangerous, for a person feels that he is the only person on earth, who is carrying the burden of the world on his shoulders and wallow sin self-pity and it will take quite a sum and the help of well-known, trained, psychiatrists– with a number of sittings – before he can see and face the world in a right perspective and in a different frame of mind.

The film directors for both the TV Screens and the films meant for the theaters have evolved music into more than being an art. They are intelligent enough to realize that music by itself will not tell a story, show an event, or express and object without a moving picture weaved into it. By this way, they focus a person's feelings and emotions with a more powerful effect. The Dream Merchants create a story, where the county's heartthrobs - heroes and heroines – sing those powerful lyrics, even if they are bereft of all logic and commonsense. The movie watchers are swayed by the dramatic settings visualized by these dream merchants eagerly lapping-up every second all that is shown on the big screen. They start identifying their real life incidents with the imaginary incidents in the movies, and in all innocence commit acts, which, by itself, a huge chapter – out of scope of this article - which needs to be told. The brainwashed movie audiences never stop for a moment to think that the three hours that they spent in a movie hall could have been utilized in a better way to do something constructive with their ordinary lives. The story goes that the bedazzled spectators would get up in the days of old to watch a movie actress at the height of her popularity from 5 am in the morning to catch a close glimpse of her, when she would appear in the balcony exactly at 8 am and would wave to her admiring fans and later disappear into the inner confines of her house. It did not matter to the people who were gripped with the mania that they could not get close to her for the security was airtight around her house, or talk to her and touch her. Once they had taken in her full view, they would cherish it in their memories for she had made their day. Her soul-elevating presence was what mattered to them. In the end of the day, they would return back in the same restless states to their dilapidated houses, and do little more to brighten the spiritual or material progress of their families, who had resigned themselves to their fate, and lost out on hope in seeing better days in their lives. To sum it up, a dose of the right sort of music and lyrics can powerfully alter normal human behavior.

But, Music by itself does not need the crutches of the cinema in order to make it melodramatic. It does not have to show an event, tell a story, or express an object that can give expression to an object. Emotions can be expressed through music even if there are no lyrics. In experiments conducted purely instrumental pieces have been played with a melody to convey a story, and the listener lost in its charming tunes drifts into a fantasy – a world of his own making and gets lost in emotions in the mental images created by him in the innermost recesses of his mind, and they make up their own story as they go along with the music. However, if the notes of the music were not changed but the melody was from sad into gay, it would bring out different mood in the listener and no one could say it was the original piece of music that had been played to him for the first time.

The different mood swings that can be brought about by the music can be categorized into three categories: pleasure or displeasure, arousal and non-arousal and dominance to submissiveness. The moods in the song, with its accompanying music, always falls into one of these three categories destined to please you, arouse you or to make you more powerful or in case of aggressive demands and tendencies in the females to make them more submissive, docile and moderate creatures happy with the bare essentials that befall their lot. They never complain about their needs toothier husbands as it would go against the norms of the decent society of which the female is a part and such a female would be regarded as a renegade, who has departed from the time established norms of the society. There is proof that different musical notes cause change of moods – major and minor – associated with happiness and sadness, along with other feelings such as shivers, tears, and a feeling of a lump in the throat – that would only take a pinprick - to make that person cry. Again, we notice the power of music for its mind-altering properties.

Unlike other arts Music finds its expression in way an artist feels, and his impact on the audience that affects the feelings of emotions on a listener in a person – from sheer joy to a brooding sadness – that brings about the same effect on the listeners. A piece of music affects us in a direct way for the brain takes in music into the right hemisphere, which is the center of all our outlets of musical and other artistic creations, whereas, the left portion of the brain is reserved for learning and to coordinate motor skills. The nervous system in our brain responds in different ways depending on our moods and our surroundings.

For instance, a sudden loud song may bring about a feeling of alertness in a person if he is sleeping soundly. On the other hand, if a person has decided to go to an orchestra conducted by a rock band, it would not bring about the same reaction for you know the place where you are going and what is expected from there. Music is, therefore, capable of altering our emotions elevate moods, and serene songs or music brings about the best of spirituality in a person who use it and foolishly believe it as a means to communicate with God and be at peace with their inner selves. Historically, music and songs, have encouraged soldiers marching into battles to bolster their courage, singing lullabies to babies for them to sleep, during courtship with females – when in moment of weakness she aggresses to marry the person who proposes to her and spends the rest of her life regretting about her decision – it has the power to influence societies. Music can affect our behavior without our being consciously aware about it. Teenagers cannot live without music for their pervert addiction to it, for they have to keep in stride, with the trends set by their peers in the society. Rap and Heavy metal music is setting the trends in the modern times and psychologists state that it simply reflects the alienation, powerlessness and aggressiveness among adolescents. Normally, the parents – in Western countries – try to refine the musical talents and tastes in their children. But when these role models are unavailable due to some reason, the children seek the latest trends to give them a sense of identity, acceptance by their peers and feelings of power. Children who identify with this music show frequent outbreaks of temper at the slightest pretext and there is a concern among the older generations that the present music trends are responsible for creating indelible psychiatric illnesses in their children.

Music tastes change, as a person gets older and heads into a more mature way of life. But the “innocent “music,” which they listened in their teens has given way to new horrors for their children for they need more stronger music to relate to. Their children now have their favorite bands, songs, and genres of music, which grates on their ears. They usually keep quiet believing it to be a passing fancy in their children, for they believe that their intensity of emotions will fade away after a time, when their children get bored listening to the same songs time and again. Nevertheless, their children show no signs of letting go of their favorite musicians and songs for they are now hooked to song. For them, listening to particular songs triggers a certain emotion in their bodies, which are specifically related to their songs.

Nevertheless, the fact remains that music can affect our moods, emotions, and physiological responses whether we like the music or not. Today, Music is rated as one of the most expressive and important forms of art. It has the ability to inevitably tap the still, mysterious deep well of our emotions. Despairingly those emotions will continue to grow with the music and generations that come to bring about more negative traits in a human personality as we pass through different generations.

DOES ISLAM HAVE THE ANSWER?

It is narrated in a Hadith that the messenger of Allah said: “Music develops a desire for fornication in the hearts of human beings as a rain causes the growth of plants in the fields.” This prophetic statement was directed towards tones. Now think about the satanic tones and vulgar songs that the modern music carries with it in which they are guided by insinuation to hate their religion. The simple-minded parents permit their children to listen to the music without knowing that through this small gadget, which they have presented him, he is developing hatred towards his religion.