Monday, February 27, 2006

earworm

I don't know where I first heard the expression (or read about it, to be more accurate), but someone decided that the term "earworm" was just the way to refer to the music loops that play constantly in (some people's) brains. I say "some people's," because I have come to learn that not everyone has a perpetual soundtrack in their mind. I do, needless to say, and sometimes it can be sheer torture. Much of my earworm is dependent on music I have recently heard. Last week, for example the earworm was from choir practice, and it was a three or four measure loop of music I didn't even like!!!!! Oh, it was awful to have to listen to it over and over. You'd think it could be cured by listening to some other music, but it's not that easy.
Yesterday and today, thankfully, my soundtrack is (again) from choir practice, but this time we did late Renaissance music, so it is both lovely and prayerful.
Do you have an internal soundtrack? What are you listening to now?

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I, too, have an almost constant soundtrack. I wonder if it is familial? We were surrounded with music--remember the "hi-fi" and Dad's 8-tracks? I have read that the way to rid one's self of an earworm is to somehow continue the song in your head all the way through to completion.---harv681

Anonymous said...

Hi Sr. Anne,
I have an internal sound track too! Sometimes I love it, and other times it drives me crazy! I can't stand it when there's a song stuck in your head, but you can't remeber all the lyrics. So it just replays the section that you do know over and over until you finally just have to listen to something else over and over and get that stuck in your head!!! (You can never win! :-)) I just finished piano practice, so I have Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven stuck in my head. It is one of my favorite classical pieces but it plays itself over....and over...and over....

Sister Anne said...

My best earworms are ones I can pray with: versions of songs, snippets of Handel's Messiah, etc. but it's kind of the luck of the draw, really. Maybe some little neuron hiccupping. The music just depends on which neuron gets the hiccups.

Anonymous said...

probably about 50% of the time, I have Summertime from Porgy and Bess looping in my head and occassionaly escaping through the mouth. I think it is just a reaction to the windchill being 15F below. The rest of the time it is dependent on music I hear or somebody saying something that reminds me of a song. The odd one I get occassionally, for no apparent reason, and one that gets me lots of weird stares if I hum along... The russian national anthem - peace - marika

Saint Peter's helpers said...

I have Mozart's aria Queen of the Night going in my head right now. If I wasn't paying attention and you were humming a tune right now, it'll be ringing in my ear the next few days.