Framing emotional responses to music: music-making and social well-being in early nineteenth-century England

Thormählen, W. (2018) Framing emotional responses to music: music-making and social well-being in early nineteenth-century England. In: The Routledge Companion to Music, Mind, and Well-Being. Routledge music companions . Routledge, Abingdon, pp. 93-105. ISBN 9781138057760 (hardback) 9781315164717 (e-book)

Abstract

Toward the end of the eighteenth century, the acts of listening to music and making music were systemically framed as relating to separate types of experiences, the one aesthetic, the other social, and educational. Large-scale amateur choral singing – paradigmatic of the latter – was born of the desire for a collective achievement that could aid the establishment of one’s identity as an individual and as member of a group. The emotions inspired through collective singing became drivers for the desire to affirm agency and establish a voice. This historical framework reveals striking similarities with the results of recent scientific research into the impact of choral singing; here, the desire for collectivity and community emerges as the central theme that defines a perception of well-being. Greater self-organization and the establishment of a plurality of identities emerge as significant substrata. Comparing these two historical moments suggests that current research might be usefully expanded through greater attention to emotions not as physical processes but as drivers, both internally and externally.

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