30 | music as medicine

I recently started reading Daniel Levitin’s I HEARD THERE WAS A SECRET CHORD: MUSIC AS MEDICINE. Within the first few pages, Levitin hit upon something that I have often thought about in relation to sport:

We may think of science and art as standing in opposition to one another, but they are bound by a common objective. Science seeks to find truth in the natural world; art seeks to find truth in the emotional world. Medicine fits somewhere in between, bridging science, art, and the emotions that move us toward the will to survive, to heal, to take our medicine, to exercise, and to put in motion all those things that keep us healthy. It is no accident that word ‘motion’ is part of the word ‘emotion.’ Both come from the Latin emovere: to move, move out, or move through. As music moves through us, it signals, exercises, and invokes emotions.

Levitin packs a ton in that short section but a few things jumped out at me:

• Latin for the win - My old man was the product of a Catholic education that left him ready with the Latin origin for most situations. As Levitin points out, the Latin roots force you to acknowledge that emotion is part of movement whether we want to admit that or not. So perhaps it is smart to embrace it rather than fight it.

• Movement in all respects - I often describe my interests around sport as two-fold: how athletes move and what moves athletes. Reducing athletic skill to technique or science may be the most efficient method of moving. But what gets lost with that approach? All the things that make movement meaningful. That make it unique. That make it a form of expression or catharsis. I know that the future is trending toward full-robot, but I am not on board.

• Pursue truth - I once had a colleague who argued that you couldn’t go wrong in research if you made sure to keep pursuing truth. Scientific truth is only half of the story. And often leaves you looking for proof rather than truth. Truth is more than perfect technique. It is more than made baskets. It is much deeper and more personal than that. I will always favor a sporting reality that allows for meaning beyond a box score.

• Perception is personal - The recent explosion in motor learning around keeping perception and action coupled is admirable. And I agree with it. But what frames perception and how we make meaning? Emotions. Motivations. Athletes are humans who bring their own past and current intentions to movement situations. It isn’t just about recognizing the environmental cues that will lead to optimal athletic outcomes that you have prioritized as a coach. It is about recognizing the person (or people) at the center of the movement experience and the meaning that they are making with their performance.

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I had a conversation the other day with an athlete who grew up in Spain. As she described basketball in terms of joy, feeling, freedom, and creativity, I couldn’t help but wonder how she would have described her sport had she grown up in the U.S. system. Personally, I will take expression over efficiency any day. I can still remember pitching against a team in college that had two hitters near the middle of the lineup*. Landon Hoffstettler was a 6 and half foot left-handed slap hitter. Such a waste. Both in terms of what physics set as his ceiling and how beautiful a left-handed swing can be when fully unleashed. Max Douglas was a 6 foot right-hander who swung out of his rear on every offering. I feared for my life with every below average fastball I threw toward the plate when Douglas hit, but I loved how he played the game. And although I remember both of those opponents, only one brings a smile to my face some 25 years post-playing!

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* Names changed to provide cover to both the athletes and my fading memory 

Imtiyaz Ali Mir, Moniruddin Chowdhury, Rabiul Md Islam, Goh Yee Ling, Alauddin A.B.M. Chowdhury, Zobear Md Hasan, Yukihito Higashi. 2021. Relaxing music reduces blood pressure and heart rate among pre-hypertensive young adults: A randomized control trial. J Clin Hypertens, 23, 317-322.

summary: Researchers divided 30 pre-hypertensive young adults into two groups: (1) a music group received both music therapy and a dietary plan, and (2) a control group that received only a dietary plan. Music therapy consisted of passive listening to music for 30 minutes/day, 5 days/week for 4 weeks. Both groups followed the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) plan, which was rich in fruits, vegetables, low-fat dairy, and unsaturated fat. Additionally, both groups limited sodium intake to less than 100 mmol/day. The control group did not show any changes in blood pressure or heart rate from pre- to post-testing. The music group showed significant reductions in systolic blood pressure and heart rate, and non-significant reduction in diastolic blood pressure.

potential application to sport: I recently watched the lead-in to Game 7 of Major League Baseball’s American League Championship Series between the Toronto Blue Jays and Seattle Mariners. The commentators - Dontrelle Willis, Alex Rodriguez, David Ortiz, and Derek Jeter - all discussed their Game 7 experiences. Ortiz acknowledged wasting energy during a sleepless night ahead of his first Game 7 and learning from that experience ahead of his next one. Dontrelle Willis admitted seeing how invested some fans were in the outcome and being glad that a teammate would be pitching the final inning rather than him! One of them - and I can’t remember who - said something to the effect of, “The most important thing to do is to manage your heart rate.” In sport, a relaxed body and a clear mind generally puts you in the best position to succeed. Often, relaxing in big moments involves slowing your breathing and your heart rate. If music can be a tool toward this end, why not use it!

Keni Thomas is a Philadelphia-based artist whose work often addresses sport and music. I found Keni via the beer can designs for Lucky Hare Brewing Company. It is quite possibly the only positive that ever came my way from drinking! I liked his social commentary and tendency to weave wordplay into his art, so I enlisted him to design the chordinnate logo (and eventually the Tom Petty is My DJ logo). He was great to work with so hit him up if you need art and want to feed a human rather than an algorithm!

I will never pass on an opportunity to highlight a lyric from Tom Petty (the Christ). It may not reference medicine, but definitely speaks to music’s therapeutic powers!

How ‘bout a cheer for all those bad girls?
And all the boys that play that rock and roll
They love it like you love Jesus
It does the same thing to their souls

tom petty & the heartbreakers HAVE LOVE, WILL TRAVEL

I brainstormed medical-related terminology, saved several dozen tracks, and then narrowed it to down to 15 that felt like it worked as a progression.