Music Gets You Pumped Up Like, Innit?

For those of us who have not yet noticed, music provides excellent fuel for a good workout. Now a scientific study makes it official.

Michael Miller, MD, director of preventive cardiology at the University of Maryland found last year (Miller, M. Circulation, 2008, vol 118: pp S 1148) that “joyful” music causes your blood vessels to dilate by 26%. When blood vessels dilate by a third, aerobic ability increases since more oxygen rich blood can carry blood from your lungs to the brain and muscles. All participants reported feeling joyful and a heightened sense of well being when listing to music they preferred.

The implications for exercises are backed up by a number of other studies that have shown improvements in athletic performance when people listen to music that they like. Many running and endurance events actually prohibit use of prerecorded music because of the “unfair” advantage it provides to the competitors in the event! Even some martial arts like Capoeira and Sanjuro use music to inspire their practitioners.

Dr Millers amazing discovery also noted that laughter improved blood flow. When experiment participants watched excerpts of the film Kingpin (the researchers obviously have good taste) their blood vessels dilated by up to 19%.

On the flip side, music that people found annoying or irritating actually caused anxiety and blood vessel constriction of up to 6%. We all know that bad music is annoying, but its actually bad for you too!

Anyway, my own MP3 player is set up with the belief that the feel good effect of one type of music wears off after a song or two. So I have four types of music on the MP3: positive energy (euro-dance tunes that would embarrass my most loyal friends into disassociation), negative energy (angry antisocial music that I should really be ashamed to admit to enjoying), funny (goofy spoof music that no one else seems to think is funny) and soul food (comforting dinosaur jams from the late 80’s and early 90’s plus good ol’ 60 ‘s and 70’s funk for the soul).

Here is an excerpt of what I listen to on my typical run (songs too many to list, so I’m just listing a few in each category)

Positive Energy
Facination – Alphabeat
Superstylin’ – Groove Armada
Rainbow Stylin’ – Royksopp


Negative Energy
Toxicity – System of a Down
Back Like That – Ghost Face Killah (feat. Neyo)
Lapdance – N.E.R.D.


Funny
Gin and Juice – Dynamite Hack
Tribute – Tenacious D
Cpt. Save a Ho – E40


Soul Food
Brigadier Sabari – Alpha Blondie
Castles Made of Sand – Jimmy Hendrix
Return of the Mack – Mark Morrison


Mellow
Identify – Natalie Imbruglia
Moi Je Joue – Brigitte Bardot
Snow Hey Oh – Red Hot Chili Peppers

So, if you're not so grossed out by my choice in tunes, I am available to DJ at Weddings and Barmitvahs. Call me on 07984427854 :-p.