Musical Memories

Of the five senses we humans have, I believe that the sense of smell and hearing are the most powerful. As I was innocently sitting here going through everyone's Facebook posts two of the songs that have the most meaning to me played on Pandora back-to-back!

I guess I should have expected it might happen since it is on my Paul Brown "station" and there are very few tunes that he plays that are not fantastic.  But this time it was a song by the group Fourplay followed by a Paul Brown number.

The first is called "Still the One". It is a beautiful song I first heard in my headset at work in 2008. I connected it with one of the most emotionally-charged incidents in my life and so I rarely listen to it, even though I have the CD. When that ended, the "Funky Joint" by Paul Brown followed.  I had to stop, close my eyes and listen to them both.

Music can take you back. It can whisk you off to your childhood, teen years or just yesterday. When you hear "our song" all the emotions connected to that relationship well-up, again. When you hear music from a special day or season, you have to stop and listen and if you close your eyes, you are in that place and time again. Sometimes that is a wonderful experience... sometimes the music can break your heart all over again.

They tell me that music has a close relationship to math, but even if I try to break a song into it's individual musical notes, it still has power over me that no other experience can create. Besides, I am very bad at math.

So, let's raise a toast to all the musicians who think up this form of art to entertain, amuse and move us in ways that really cannot be put into words.

Just close your eyes and let the sounds wash over your memories.