Music x Yoga

Hi Friends!

Fair warning: This might be my best and most important blog yet. It could literally change your life for the better. There’s a lot of science here, which I’ll try to explain simply, with the goal of helping you heal, whatever your challenges might be. I can’t live without music. I can’t live without yoga. Together, they form the fibers of my well-being. I’m neurodivergent. I’m asthmatic. I have tons of superpowers as I’m sure you’ve read but I also struggle with many things, including emotional regulation and breathing. Music and yoga have been crucial in helping me with these and so many other aspects of my life, including generally being happy. Let’s dive in!

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Biomusicology is the study of how music impacts biology. It includes brain processing of music, as well as the how and why of us making music, bridging neuroscience (one of my favorite areas of study), psychology, biology, and anthropology. The causes of things like perfect pitch and perfect rhythm, two things I have which are blessings or curses depending on context, are not super well studied or proven scientifically, like much of what we’ll discuss here. That said, they are definitely linked to the wiring of the brain. Music therapy is the use of music to help heal, whether it’s physical, mental, emotional, or anything else.

The human brain has about 86 billion neurons, which “talk to each other” through electricity. When many neurons fire together, they produce waves with different frequencies, which facilitate different types of activities. Low frequency waves like Delta and Theta waves, go from a total lack of awareness like in deep sleep to daydreaming and light sleep. Alpha waves, with a frequency of approximately 8 to 12 Hz (Hertz, or cycles per second), are amazing for healing. Higher frequency waves like Beta and Gamma waves are for more alert tasks like work and coming up with brilliant insights. How Music Affects Brainwaves: A Frequency Guide | Neurosity is a nice guide to understand this better.

Before we go too far, note that we can measure brain wave activity using an electroencephalogram or EEG by placing electrodes on the head and recording the electrical activity of many neurons firing in sync. A German neuropsychologist Hans Berger developed this technology nearly a hundred years ago!

Calm, balance, and focus are what alpha waves empower, and in this calm, focused state, a lot of healing can occur. They can lower anxiety and stress, help with emotional regulation, and filter irrelevant or unnecessary thoughts, among many other benefits. Emerging research suggests that heightened alpha states can also help significantly with pain management.

Music can facilitate more neurons firing at alpha frequencies, as can yoga. Together they’re an incredibly powerful tandem. The process of empowering brainwaves to shift to alpha states is called entrainment. Note that many eastern healing practices like Pranic Healing and Reiki, also use the power of calm and getting the brain into alpha states to facilitate healing. If you read my blog, Just Breathe... A Yoga Intro, you would know that pranayama is a part of my daily routine. This, too, has been shown to increase alpha activity in the brain.

Slower, 60-80 bpm (beats per minute) music has shown significant increases in alpha-waves. By contrast, faster tempos, even 100 bpm or more, decrease alpha waves in the brain. Instrumental music, like classical guitar, which I play, or even ambient music like white noise can increase alpha waves. By contrast, songs in general aren’t the best for this state, because they demand active attention. You hear a lyric or a catchy beat, and your mind wants to focus on that rather than the calm, focused state we’re seeking for healing.

Much like a plucked guitar string produces resonance, or how an instrument or object vibrates strongly at particular frequencies, other objects like Tibetan singing bowls do very similar. You will often see them used in tandem with yoga practices, including during yoga nidra, or psychic sleep, designed to get you into a certain calm awake state on the edge of sleep to facilitate healing, along with a calming voice guiding you through a meditation.

Coming back to pitch, many of you may have heard that A is tuned to 440 Hz. Studies have shown that tuning to a slightly lower frequency, 432 Hz, creates a subtly warmer and lower sound, which can reduce stress, lower anxiety, and even potentially lower heart rate and blood pressure. Binaural beats are a cool musical illusion that modern technology empowers. Basically, each ear hears a subtly different frequency, which motivates the brain neurons to fire in alpha. Effect of music at 432 Hz and 440 Hz on dental anxiety and salivary cortisol levels in patients undergoing tooth extraction: a randomized clinical trial - PMC is a great example of a scientific study measuring the power of alpha waves on salivary cortisol levels in tooth extraction patients.

If you go on Spotify or Apple Music, you can find many playlists of soft guitar music, Tibetan singing bowls, yoga nidra, binaural beats, and even alpha brain waves. While there is a lot of science here, music and yoga hit differently for different people. Find what works best for you. Pairing music to facilitate neurons firing at alpha frequencies in your brain with yoga breathing practices that do the same can set you up for deep healing. I get it. This is emerging science that might not be sufficiently proven for some of you. I would say what’s the harm in trying? You get to enjoy some nice music, you get to breathe better, and you get to calm your mind. That alone is well worth the effort in my book.

I’ll leave this here for today. Music x Yoga, the title of this blog, is an intersection of two of my passions, which can have profound positive impact. As I dove deeper in researching for this article, it was so cool to see all the neuroscience at play, another passion of mine. If you have suggestions or combinations of topics you’d like me to explore the intersections of, please let me know. I like to believe that with my prodigy strats mind, I can look at any combination of things, even ones that may seem wildly unrelated, unproven, or unconventional, and find common threads that make a positive impact in people’s lives.

That's all for today! See y'all next time! Sarang out.