In our class discussion today, we talked about how horror movies would not be the same at all if the traditional 3 chord music was being played in a suspenseful scene. The music without a tonal center is what makes horror movies scary. I was intrigued by this and I was wondering what the reasoning behind that is. I know that music can expand our range of feeling so I did some research to expand further on this. For example, according to psychologytoday.com, pleasurable music may lead to the release of neurotransmitters associated with reward, such as dopamine. On the opposite end of this spectrum, according to newsfeed.time.com, dissonant chords or unusual harsh chords trigger a biologically ingrained response by making us think our young are threatened.
I found this psychology and biology behind the responses humans have to music very interesting. This explains why scary music makes us scared and why happy music makes us happy.