It’s long been known that playing and listening to music can stimulate the brain, boost creativity and improve learning — and the benefits extend well beyond childhood.
Especially as we age, engaging with music by learning an instrument, singing in a choir or even just listening closely to a Mozart symphony can give our brains a truly meaningful workout.
Why? Because music isn’t just pleasant background noise — it’s an incredibly complex stimulus. When we hear music, sound waves are converted into electrical signals that travel through the auditory nerve to the brain stem. From there, the brain leaps into action, decoding those signals in real time. It connects each note to the next, interpreting pitch, rhythm, harmony and timing. Remarkably, the brain effectively reconstructs all these elements into the structured patterns we recognise as music.
This process involves multiple areas of the brain working together — including those responsible for memory, movement, emotion and language. In short, music demands a lot of our grey matter. That’s why music is increasingly being used in therapies for memory loss, stress and neurodegenerative conditions. So whether you’re playing piano or simply enjoying a favourite playlist, know you’re doing something truly good for your mind.
But according to research by Johns Hopkins Medicine in the USA, music can also ‘reduce anxiety, blood pressure and pain, as well as improve sleep quality, mood, mental alertness, and memory.’ Here are seven ways music can improve your physical health.
Seven benefits of listening to music
1. It can improve your heart health
Research has shown that music helps the blood to flow more easily. It does this by helping our blood vessels to dilate, improving circulation. This, in turn, means that oxygen and nutrients are delivered more efficiently to the body.
Listening to music, particularly classical or slow-tempo music, can also reduce your heart rate and lower blood pressure, by promoting relaxation and reducing our production of the 'stress hormone', cortisol (more on that shortly).
Finally, music can increase levels in the blood of those ‘feel-good’, calming hormones, serotonin and endorphins.
Try this: Erik Satie: Gymnopédies
2. It can lift your mood
Here’s another of the many benefits of music: it can significantly boost the brain’s production of dopamine – the so-called 'pleasure hormone' – which plays a key role in relieving anxiety and lifting depression. This happens because music is processed not only by the auditory system but also by the amygdala, the part of the brain deeply involved in regulating mood and emotional responses.
When you listen to music you enjoy, especially something that moves or excites you, your brain responds by releasing dopamine in much the same way it does when you eat a favourite food or engage in physical activity. In fact, the emotional impact of music is often compared to the effects of aerobic exercise, such as walking, cycling or swimming, which raise levels of serotonin, another mood-enhancing chemical. Together, these mechanisms show how music can be a powerful, natural tool for boosting emotional well-being and resilience.
Try this: Something joyous and uplifting. Like the first movement of Beethoven's dance-like Symphony No. 7.
3. It can reduce stress
When we’re feeling stressed, it’s not just an emotional experience – there’s a real biological impact on the body. In response to stress, the adrenal glands release the hormone cortisol, which is designed to help us cope with immediate challenges. Cortisol boosts energy, sharpens focus, and prepares the body for a “fight or flight” response – useful in short bursts.
However, when stress becomes chronic, the body remains in a heightened state for too long, and cortisol levels stay elevated. This ongoing exposure can disrupt the body’s natural balance, weakening the immune system, disturbing sleep, and impairing memory and concentration. Over time, this prolonged stress response has been linked to anxiety, depression, digestive issues, and even chronic pain.
Understanding how stress affects us biologically is the first step in learning how to manage it. Activities like listening to music can help lower cortisol levels and restore calm. According to a 2021 study, quoted on PsychCentral, listening to ‘both personal and neutral selections of music... significantly “reduced cortisol levels”. This was found regardless of the music type.
And, similarly to the practice of meditation, listening to music with a slower pulse can actively reduce a stress-induced high heart rate, too. So largo and andante slow movements of concertos, symphonies and chamber music could work wonders for your heart.
Try this: Some of the soothing, celestial music of the Medieval abbess and visionary Hildegard von Bingen:
4. It can help you to manage pain
Its ability to reduce both heart rate and stress hormones means that music is also your friend when it comes to pain management. It does this by providing a strong opposing stimulus to the brain’s pain signals. Music can reduce the way the brain interprets pain intensity as well. For this reason, music can have many benefits in geriatric and intensive care, or palliative medicine.
Research has also shown, for instance, that listening to music can reduce the pain in those suffering from fibromyalgia (widespread musculoskeletal pain and fatigue). It does this in several ways. Most simply, music provides a competing stimulus that shifts attention away from pain. Since the brain processes pain and sound in overlapping regions, engaging with music can reduce the perception of pain intensity.
Try this: something calm but stimulatingly intricate, we'd suggest. Like Bach's magnificent Brandenburg Concertos.
5. It can help you eat less
As incredible as it might sound, playing music during a meal can help you slow down while eating and, ultimately, consume less food in a single sitting. A 2012 study by Cornell University found that people tend to eat less at a restaurant when the lighting and music is softer and more ambient. In fact, this reduced calorie intake by 18%.
More so, research carried out by the University of Lincoln in collaboration with De Montfort University found that music can help those suffering with emotional eating tendencies.
Participants in the study were initially asked to recall sad memories. They then listened to pre-selected music, or were left in silence for three minutes, before taking part in a snack test. Those who ate in silence consumed over eight grams of snack foods whereas those listening to music ate significantly less – between four and five grams.
So, if you're looking to curb emotional eating or simply enjoy a more mindful meal, try turning down the lights and turning up the music. Your appetite—and waistline—just might thank you.
Try this: Claude Debussy: Images
6. It can get you exercising more
Listening to motivating, upbeat music can boost endurance and physical performance, helping you to nail that tough exercise session.
According to a study published in Scientific American, music creates a ‘rhythm response’ – or a tendency to synchronise your movements to the musical beat. This can help you maintain pace and use your energy more efficiently.
It also provides a distraction from the feeling of exhausted muscles, elevating your mood and replacing negative thoughts with a ‘can do’ attitude.
Among other benefits, studies have suggested that music can increase endurance during a workout by up to 15 per cent. Not only that, but exercising to music also appears to enhance our emotional states, making the activity significantly more enjoyable. It can even foster a positive mindset even during high-intensity workouts, helping individuals push through moments of near exhaustion.
Try: 'Mars' from Gustav Holst's The Planets, or Johannes Brahms's Hungarian Dance No. 5: perfect uptempo pieces to accompany gym sessions, running or other high-intensity workouts.
7. It can improve your balance
A study reported in Harvard Health found that music helped people over the age of 65 who were at risk of falling, but otherwise free of neurological and orthopaedic issues. Half the 134 male and female participants were trained to walk and perform various physical movements in time to music, while the other half continued as normal. ‘At the end of six months, the "dancers" exhibited better gait and balance than their peers — and they also experienced 54% fewer falls.’
Try this: Ottorino Respighi: Ancient Airs and Dances