Music Of Our Youth

I have always enjoyed music. It alters the mood, creates a backdrop for life’s salient memories and gives fullness to our existence. In particular music of my teens and twenties. 

The hip-hop and rap that is the vogue today is strange to me. And most of what goes for pop today are endless imitations. Yet, I can always listen to my old favorites;  Depeche Mode, Phil Collins, Cat Stevens, Janis Ian, ABBA (yes ABBA!), Neil Diamond, Queen, Van Halen, Dire Straits, many more. 

Music rekindles some of life’s most poignant times. So why do songs from our young years hold such disproportionate sway over our memories and emotions? Why is our earlier music the source of such delectable nostalgia?

THE PLEASURE CIRCUIT

Neuro-imaging studies show that our favorite songs activate the brain’s pleasure circuit creating an influx of dopamine, serotonin and oxytocin, that makes us feel good. The more we like a song the greater the release of this heady mix of neurochemical bliss. Music is sparks to the brain and to the young it is fireworks. In our formative years the brain undergoes rapid neurological development. Due to increased hormonal balances a song creates memory traces laden with heightened emotion. The times when we often feel we just can’t get no satisfaction.

In our teens music is inextricably intertwined with our social lives. It is the time when we discover friendships and romance for the first time. We share music as a token of our belonging to a certain group and we endlessly play the tunes we shared with our first sweethearts. Like a rolling stone, music melds and shapes our sense of self.

REMINISCENCE BUMP

A further reason for the special semblance of the tunes of youth is what psychologists call the reminiscence bump – the phenomenon that we recall events of our younger adult lives so much more vividly than other more mature years of our passage. Reminiscence theory says we all have a script that serves as a memory and narrative of our lives. When we think about our past the memories that dominate usually have a few things in common; those that are recalled most easily are emotional, mostly happy and cluster around the time when we were sweet sixteen.

MEMORY MAKERS

These years are the time of the emergence of a stable and enduring self – it is the time when you become yourself. Memories related to this passage are not just important for a sense of self – in many ways it is who you are.

Music becomes the memory activators of these times in our lives and it forms the soundtrack to the upheaval of early adulthood. It is the emotional afterglow of our first dance, our first break-up, our first acceptance into a group, our first sense of independence and the of the time when we had more time. The nostalgia that accompanies hearing our favorite old songs isn’t just a quick recollection; it's theme song of who we have become.

BACK TO NOW

Perhaps experiencing new music does not really become weaker over time but changes more from an emotional ride to an appreciative aesthetic experience. But my youth music will always be a mood changer and inspiration. Whenever I hear those old treasured songs and melodies, the memories of the times surges anew.