Smarter people listen to instrumental music: study

New York Post ^ | May 23rd, 2019 | By Hannah Sparks

[Mariner]

here seems to be an air of pretension among aficionados of jazz and classical music, psychological research is giving them good reason.

A new study published in Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences suggests that those who prefer instrumental music tend to be more intelligent.

Study author Elena Racevska, a PhD student at Oxford Brookes University, became interested in how musical preference is tied to personality traits as she learned about the Savanna-IQ Interaction Hypothesis, which presumes that more intelligent individuals seek more novel experiences compared to less intelligent people.

“After reading Kanazawa’s papers, one of which was on the relationship between intelligence and musical preferences, we decided to further test his hypothesis using a different set of predictors — namely, a different type of intelligence test (i.e. a nonverbal measure), and the uses of music questionnaire,” says Racevska. “We also measured a number of variables likely to have an effect in this relationship, such as taking part in extra-curricular music education, its type and duration.”

[nopardons]

Since The Lone Ranger theme is from the WILLIAM TELL overture, that really does count; as does the old FLASH GORDON movies using Wagner’s RING music as background music! ;^)

[Boogieman]

“Does it mean ALL people that listen to instrumental only are smarter or that switching to instrumental only makes you smarter?”

Actually, you can gain a full 10 IQ points if you listen to at least 4 hours of banjo instrumentals a day.

[wally_bert]

I like the inspirational music I’ve heard at a temple open houses.

Even though I don’t understand the language, the rest I think I get. Sort of,

[pax_et_bonum]

Don’t need no stinkin’ lyrics.

[chajin]

Really smart people cannot listen to the illogic of jazz.

Jazz at its best is just as polyphonic as Palestrina, just as harmonic as Haydn, just as complex as Chopin, just as riveting as Ravel, and requires the musicianship of a Marsalis or a Milhaud--who as a classical composer taught jazz to Dave Brubeck, who taught it to Darius Brubeck, who taught it to Pamela Myburgh among many others.

America has its classical composers who are the equal of anything out of Europe, from MacDowell to Gershwin to Ives to Still to Copland to Bernstein to Cascarino to John Adams and John Williams, but jazz at its best is the American classical music.

[MarDav]

And then, of course, there’s some stuff like this:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mwvCw01l1Do

[Mariner]

“because they are a distraction and I know what is going on/being sung anyway”

Like, how many times does one have to hear Violetta’s lamentations to get the picture? lol

Or, Rigoletto’s regrets.

Or the fury of Wotan.

[C210N]

Love Classical, it’s the only music I listen to.

Hate Copeland. NPR is CONSTANTLY playing his Appalachian Spring. I hear 1/4 second of it, and reflexes take over, and I’m on another station. Copeland is the Progressive classical.

[M1903A1]

I’m not only one of those strange people that likes elevator music, I also like (and collect) production music...the instrumental background music from commercials, training films, and the like.

[chajin]

The amount of classical music snippets found in TV commercials is quite surprising once you begin to listen for it. The dog food commercial with Satie's je te veux, the Clorox commercial with the 9th's scherzo (used to be the closing music to Huntley-Brinkley), and the Crayola commercial with the Dies Irae from Verdi's Requiem are three on the TV now, not counting numerous past examples.

[the_individual2014]

I’m not ashamed to say I been listening alot of jazz, instrumental and even opera music such as Nessum Dorma from Turandot.

[nopardons]

Or Pagliacci's weepy and snarling and then weepy lament, or Madama Butterfly's heartbreak, and on and on and on! :-)

And then there's Prince Calaf's aria, NESSUM DORMA, in Turandot, and I couldn't care less, if I tried, about the words! The same is true for The Queen of the Night's opening aria and almost all of the rest of THE MAGIC FLUTE.

[nopardons]

T.V. commercials have also used a LOT of stuff from all of the Gilbert&Sullivan operettas too; which struct me as VERY funny, when I was a very little kiddo and we got our first T.V.! All I could hear ( and it’s still true ), is Gilbert’s very clever words and NOT what the commercial is trying to push.

[TBP]

“Music makes us feel a feeling. Words make us think a thought. But a song makes us feel a thought.” — Yip Harburg, Broadway lyricist

[TBP]

people who like rap are generally racist, misogynist, hate-filled imbeciles.

[King Moonracer]

Tangerine Dream, yeah. No words no crap.

[TBP]

Get Bach. I can’t Handel it.

[chajin]

And then, of course, there’s some stuff like this:

No argument from me on this one, but it is very little different from the 20th century avant garde classical music that, outside of avant garde circles, no one listens to willingly. Every semester I spend 2/3 of my music courses convincing students of the quality and power of classical music, and then I have to teach about Cage and Crumb and other crap, just like my art course colleague has to teach about the Madonna with elephant dung and Piss Christ.

[chajin]

“Music makes us feel a feeling. Words make us think a thought. But a song makes us feel a thought.” — Yip Harburg, Broadway lyricist

"I knew a very wise man [who] believed if a man were permitted to make all the ballads he need not care who should make the laws of a nation, and we find that most of the ancient legislators thought that they could not well reform the manners of any city without the help of a lyric, and sometimes of a dramatic poet." (Andrew Fletcher, 1703)

[TBP]

That has lyrics.

Have a Lark, have a Lark, have a Lark today.
Have a Lark, have a Lark, have a Lark today.
Have a Lark, have a Lark, have a Lark today.
Have a Lark, have a Lark today.

—OR—

Have a pizza, pizza, Pizza Roll.
Have a pizza, pizza, Pizza Roll.
Have a pizza, pizza, Pizza Roll.
Have a pizza, Pizza Roll.