Singing is good for you! Official!

Subject: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: Mr Happy
Date: 04 Aug 04 - 07:55 PM

Singing is good for you - official

Researchers in Germany are claiming that singing is good for you, mentally and physiologically.
Scientists at the University of Frankfurt took blood samples from amateur choir members before and after they sang Mozart's Requiem. After the singing, the levels of chemicals needed for a well-functioning immune system were significantly higher.
A week later, the choir had to listen to a recording of the Requiem but not sing it. This time the chemical levels were not above normal. The researchers also found that the positive mood of the participants improved during the singing.
Their study is to be published in the Journal of Behavioural Medicine.3 February 2004
Felicity Greenland

Wot y'all think?- It certainly lifts me up when I got the blues!

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: David Ingerson
Date: 04 Aug 04 - 08:50 PM

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: David Ingerson
Date: 04 Aug 04 - 08:51 PM

Oops! I just got too excited there.

You bet. It lifts me up when I don't have the blues. I can't think of a time when it hasn't.

David

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: JennyO
Date: 04 Aug 04 - 09:44 PM

It comes as no surprise to me at all, having been there and done that - anything that feels that good has to be good for you. I'm in the Solidarity Choir in Sydney and it gives me a real buzz to be raising my voice with others. Singing chorus songs, particularly with a large group, has the same effect. In fact ANY kind of singing seems to have a positive effect - even singing along in the car. So I think the results of this research are really just confirming what a lot of us already "knew".

It's been a good week for this kind of nice news. Earlier this week there was an article in one of our papers here, The Sydney Morning Herald about another one of my pleasures in life, wine. I posted the article in this thread. It all just confirms to me that a lot of the time our bodies are telling us what they need, if only we will listen.

Jenny

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: Amos
Date: 04 Aug 04 - 10:23 PM

For sure, for sure! But I am not sure, as JennyO says, that anything that feels good is good for you. I can think of a few practices that would feel good for a while, but end up being quite harmful involving women and vegetables.

The vegetables, for example, might be tobacco, or hemp. The women shall go unnamed out of common courtesy and basic chivalry.

A

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 05 Aug 04 - 03:53 AM

Hemp is very dangerous indeed! Many people have been hanged with it.

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: jacqui.c
Date: 05 Aug 04 - 07:17 AM

On the singing thing, just look at small children. Quite often they will be singing away as they play. It almost seems to be a subconscious thing with them. They're at a point when no-one has yet tried to make them 'behave' or be quiet and they just do what comes naturally.

I always feel better when I've been singing, wherever I am. Not so sure about the effect on the audience, but I enjoy it.

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: JennyO
Date: 05 Aug 04 - 12:54 PM

Women and vegetables Amos? The mind boggles :-)

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: GUEST,belter
Date: 05 Aug 04 - 01:34 PM

I always figured it was the stage fright getting my heart rate up. I've left sessions at 4am feeling wide awake and set for a 2 hour drive home. Ofcoarse adrenelen doesn't last that long. That could have been very unhealthy. I mean driving with my eyes closed. I don't recomend it.

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: TheBigPinkLad
Date: 05 Aug 04 - 02:53 PM

How do you explain Goths, then? ;o)

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: Alice
Date: 05 Aug 04 - 03:38 PM

Yes, singing is good for you, but we already knew that, right?

Alice

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 05 Aug 04 - 04:47 PM

O.K singing is good for me....but what about the poor folk who have to listen to me singing..is it not better for me to shut up...at least only one person suffers then...ME! Best wishes.

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 05 Aug 04 - 05:24 PM

Nothing to do with all that controlled oxygen intake then?

I must admit, the year I took out of controlled singing regularly (weekly or more) was a lot more difficult than I realised. And I've only realised it now that I've taken up singing regularly again.

Plus, like a lot of things, the more you do it, the better you get at it and the longer you can hold it for.

Limpit is forever singing around the house, be it 'London Bridge', the fairy song she made up herself or 'Smoke on the Water'..... She's weird is my child!

LTS

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: Amos
Date: 05 Aug 04 - 05:32 PM

GS:

This is how life gives lessons -- in this case, it teaches them to take up singing louder than you!!

A

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: jacqui.c
Date: 05 Aug 04 - 06:15 PM

Liz - my grandson's the same - he's almost four and is always singing, either songs he's learned in nursery or ones he makes up himself Right now I'm trying to get him interested in the guitar as well. Maybe the new generation of folkies is up and coming!

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: GUEST,Nancy King at work
Date: 05 Aug 04 - 08:37 PM

Delighted to have my prejudices confirmed!

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: Mudlark
Date: 06 Aug 04 - 01:09 PM

I knew it! Would be interesting to see if chem. levels any higher in group, as opposed to solo, singing. I always feel better after singing, even if I'm just singing old Johnny Mercer stuff from the 40;s while doing dishes. But I remember there was a special high from singing in a mass of voices...like being inside a vast music-making machine.

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: Roger the Skiffler
Date: 07 Aug 04 - 06:45 AM

...but in my case not for the audience!

RtS

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: Herma
Date: 07 Aug 04 - 07:05 AM

Thanks for this thread...guess I felt it before I knew!
My singing pulled me through a lot of bad times in my life...thankful for that..
Would like to know as well if there is a different chemical reaction in singing solo or together with other people.
Considering my latest experience just a couple of weeks back -when a rather large crowd of people joined in with my (unaccompanied) singing- that it probably IS different...I never felt so elated before...it was the very first time that such a thing happened to me, by the way...

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: C-flat
Date: 07 Aug 04 - 01:48 PM

It's no surprise to most of us that singing makes us feel good, after all, it's such a natural thing to do. What is odd is how we've managed, through time, to make it something we don't do in public unless we're entertaining.
A childs' lack of inhibition means that he or she is quite comfortable to break in to song at any moment, totally unconcerned at who may be listening, whereas most adults restrict themselves to the shower or the car.
Some time ago I bought a course of singing lessons for my partner and, although she has no intention of singing to an audience, I'm delighted that she has continued because she returns from each lesson so uplifted it's almost a spiritual experience for her. As someone who had never sang in front of another adult since childhood, it has been a liberating experience for her and one, I'm sure, many others could benefit from.


C-flat.

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: GUEST,Anne Croucher
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 08:35 AM

Just back from the Sidmouth folk festival and realise that at the beginning of the week I was singing quietly with the words on hand in case I forgot - by the end of the week I was confidently belting out the verses with no book - and the 'audience' was harmonising some really wonderful choruses. I never even noticed it was happening until it was over.

There should have been gloom and doom as it was 'the last Sidmouth' but everyone seemed confident that there would be something happening next year, organised or not.

I think that it is the normal state to sing in company, and silence and solitude are wrong for us.

Anne

Subject: RE: Singing is good for you! Official!
From: AggieD
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 08:52 AM

Having just had a good sing with the festival choir at Sidmouth, I certainly felt great after each workshop.

I often sing my heart out when driving alone, as I find it keeps me far more alert than just listening to music.