Read on to discover just how and why classical music is able to calm us when we are anxious...
Classical music can help to calm our anxiety... and it also helps our pets
Once dinner is over and the dishes are cleared, we settle on the sofa to unwind. Elgar’s Mina is playing; gentle string melodies emerge, furnished with delicate percussion. Jaws unclench and muscles relax as we are ensconced in the light music. A flash of green and pink at the window is accompanied by a loud gun-shot sound. The night sky is filled with glittering chandeliers.
Inside, too, sparks fly. I turn up Debussy’s Rêverie and plump a cushion. My companion settles once more, soothed by the rippling piano. Recent studies have shown how certain music can lower cortisol, colloquially known as the stress hormone, resulting in various different applications. It’s the reason why, every Bonfire Night, Diwali, New Year – and any other time fireworks are prevalent – many cat and dog lovers turn to dedicated playlists to comfort their furry companions, who often find the stimuli overwhelming.
Classical music to calm us... slow and steady works best
Such soundtracks – ‘Music for guinea pigs, hamsters and rabbits’ on Apple Music features tinny recordings of the ‘Moonlight’ Sonata, the theme to Bach’s Goldberg Variations and Liszt’s Liebestraum No. 3 – naturally focus on pieces with a slow pace and on-beat rhythms to reduce agitation. Classic FM’s Pet Classics programme is co-curated with the RSPCA and includes music such as ‘Sheep may safely graze’ (Bach).
The steady quavers and tidy cadences satisfy innate musical anticipation, reducing anxiety. Humans can derive benefit alongside their animals: with the sheep happy in their field there is no need to count them jumping over stiles during restless nights.
Lullabies... our first calming melodies
This therapeutic benefit of music is not a new discovery. Parents have sung to calm their children since time immemorial, with the lullaby becoming an established format during Romanticism. From Brahms’s Wiegenlied, a cradle song dedicated to his friend Bertha Faber on the birth of her second son, to the Seal Lullaby by Eric Whitacre, there exists a broad sleep-inducing soundtrack.
Of course, the lullaby is not purely didactic; Brahms’s song – intertwined melodies set to words about seeing paradise in one’s dreams – is a thinly veiled love letter to Faber. Nonetheless, the main theme has been associated with relaxation ever since. It’s one of the first pieces of music I ever encountered: as a toddler I owned a stuffed rabbit that played a synthetic version of the tune on repeat, which I’m sure wasn’t at all annoying to the adults.
Calm classical music... increasing popularity as we prioritise mental health
As more people engage with their mental health, so grow new audiences for restful classical music. It’s the reason why Radio 3 Unwind has recently joined the BBC’s array of stations, and why Classic FM has just launched one of two new sister stations, Classic FM Calm, focusing entirely on soothing soundscapes. I download the app of the latter and write this listening to Martin James Bartlett playing Bach’s ‘Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring’, having previously heard Ólafur Arnalds’s Momentary. My resting heartbeat is low, and I realise I’ve been looking out of the window for several minutes. A ‘compare the meerkat’ advert brings me out of this daydream.
Of course, one person’s salve is another’s sore – and what works one day might not have the same impact the next. Calm may turn to melancholy or irritation. Emotional pliability is part of being human – although it would be useful for particular music to guarantee a given response, things are rarely so simple. ‘We process music as individuals, so two people could have very different reactions to the same piece,’ says Clare Maddocks, a neurologic music therapist who is the director of education and research for the British Association for Music Therapy (BAMT). ‘What’s soothing for one person might aggravate another.’
Calm classical music in clinical settings
Avoiding music with sad or negative associations
Music is well established as a cradle-to-grave psychological clinical intervention; while its use goes far beyond simply calming, achieving such a state can be a useful place to start. Memory is often tied up in melody – hence its use in some types of rehabilitation – so certain pieces or genres are to be avoided. ‘The classic example is music played at a funeral,’ explains Maddocks. ‘It can be very potent hearing that work again afterwards, even years later.’ I think of my father’s funeral service, for which I selected violinist Jennifer Pike’s recording of The Lark Ascending (with the Chamber Orchestra of New York and Salvatore Di Vittorio) because together we’d heard her play the music in concert. Vaughan Williams’s poignancy stings, and I actively avoid listening to it.
Simple chord patterns and predictable rhythms
To get around such associations, therapists often improvise their own music during sessions. ‘I use a simple patten, perhaps just four chords, and a very predictable rhythm,’ says Maddocks. ‘Complex harmony requires more processing and taking on more stimulation when you may be over-stimulated.’ Regulation is key to feeling calm. ‘When you become dis-regulated, you might experience a sense of anxiety and physical responses such as sweating, goose bumps and digestion issues,’ says Maddocks. ‘Your body is tapping into an ancient part of the brain that has evolved to respond when it senses threat.’
Finding the right tempo to reduce flight-or-fight responses
In clinical settings, therapists often use a single instrument, even paring back sound to an untuned beat. Human bipedalism has much to do with which pulses we find appealing. Our ability to walk upright on two feet with a regular gait plays a big part in music, and that motion links to emotion. Dance music raises the heart rate from 60-100 beats per minute (BPM) to over 140BPM (Vivace), producing correlating physical responses such as sweating, adrenaline and an elevated or, if you’re lucky, euphoric mood.
Music marked at Andante – at a walking pace – or slower has the opposite effect. Taking it to its most basic level, an untuned percussive tap at 40-45BPM (Largo) can reduce fight-or-flight responses. It’s used as part of Emotional Freedom Technique – known as tapping or psychological acupressure – where practitioners, often those suffering from PTSD, gently drum various parts of their body while working through affirmations.
Classical music specifically composed to calm us
Pianist-composer Chad Lawson
Outside of healthcare, some composers set out to write music with a purely calming purpose. Pianist-composer Chad Lawson’s pulsing melodies – often played on a piano with additional felt to dampen the timbre – have titles such as Sanctuary and this is me trying, while his 2022 album breathe was created to help listeners relax. The music is combined with meditation and mindfulness chat on Lawson’s podcast Calm It Down.
Pianist-composer Peter Breiner
The improvisatory, flowing style can also be heard in Peter Breiner’s work, which includes several albums with the strapline ‘Calm Romantic Piano Music’ (Mornings, Evenings and Late Nights; Caressing Your Soul). Breiner’s sidestep into this world grew out of pandemic isolation and chimed with listener’s needs – the simple, pretty melodies in Keep Going and Monday Morning have a gentle yearning that doesn’t ever overpower. Not only do people want to hear this type of piano music; they want to play it, too. Breiner’s calming series is sold in sheet music form and played around the world.
‘Harmonically, there are no surprises – nothing atonal,’ says Breiner, who has recorded dozens of albums, encompassing everything from Baroque arrangements of the Beatles to collections of national anthems. ‘There are no virtuosic passages and frequent use of ostinatos. Dynamics remain in the lower range and the tempo is gentle.’
For his next set of calming compositions, out in May, Breiner uses a richer palette. ‘It’s a little more sophisticated, taking inspiration from Debussy to Bartók.’ It also references Dvořák, whose piano arrangements have been a surprise streaming success for Breiner – the third movement of Dvořák’s Eighth Symphony has over 27 million plays on Spotify alone. ‘My teacher’s teacher worked with Dvořák,’ explains Breiner. ‘So, he’s something of a compositional grandfather to me.’
Calm classical music... why Bach can heal everything
It can be frustrating to hear someone – usually a celebrity or MP – claim that they enjoy classical music because they find it ‘calming’. Max Richter’s Exiles and Bach’s ‘Air on the G String’ (Classic FM Calm is back on again) is no more representative of an artform than Jeff Koons’s Balloon Dog and Rembrandt’s self-portraits. When Satie composed his Gymnopédies and Gnossiennes, he aimed to distil melody into its purest form; to engage rather than clear the mind. Often, that deep engagement can be the most nutritious form of relaxation.
No-one had gone to the London Sinfonietta’s recent Boulez/Cage concert at Southbank’s Purcell Room with the idea that it would be restful. Yet, as clarinettist Mark van de Wiel moved around the music stands set out in a circle, there was a collective stillness. But Boulez’s Domaines is unlikely to appear in any calming playlists, which nearly always feature one composer: Bach. ‘My go-to music is the theme from the Goldberg Variations,’ says Breiner. ‘That heals everything.’ A good choice, too, for any guinea pigs, hamsters and rabbits that happen to be in the vicinity.