While any music can be more beneficial than no music, the greatest benefit comes from music personalization. Thus, a key part of the Music & Memory program is finding personalized music for your residents and/or loved ones.
The biggest question we receive is why personalized music? Why not just pleasant, calm, or upbeat music?
The reason the Music & Memory Program is so effective is largely due to the connection between specific music that a person enjoyed and the positive emotions and memories made in association with that music, feelings which can be awakened when hearing the music again in a different context.
How do I get started building a personalized playlist?
Put yourself in the mindset of a music investigator tasked with identifying the music genres, artists, and songs that your person enjoyed, and also identifying the popular songs within a particular period of time.
The time period to aim for should be their late childhood to mid-20s. We have an increased proportion of personal memories available during that time of our lives (this period is referred to as the reminiscence bump in memory research due to the tendency for adults to reminisce frequently about their younger days, Rubin et al. 1986) and thus a greater probability that music enjoyed from this same time period will evoke positive memories.
After you identified the target time period, ask your loved one/ resident about what kind of music and/or artists did they enjoy in their childhood through their teens and 20s? Additional follow-up questions could be:
- What kind of music did you have playing on the radio during this time?
- What were your favorite records to play?
- Who was your favorite performer, group, band, or orchestra?
- What songs were at your high school prom?
- What songs were at your wedding?
- Do you still have any records, tapes, or CDs that were favorites?
During your investigation, be sure to touch base with your person’s friends or relatives who knew them at that time or over the years. They may be able to provide helpful music preference insight.
A quick internet search can also provide a breakdown of popular music of a particular time period and within a particular genre.
Use this Music Genre/ Artist preference matrix below to reference artists whose music fell into a particular genre from the 1920s to contemporary:
Music streaming services such as Spotify and Apple Music also have playlists broken down by genre, time period, artist and/or feeling. Use these ready-made playlists to help inspire songs to add to your playlists!
Below is a resource from the Music & Memory program containing additional information on your music playlist creation journey:
This guide contains more resources on considerations regarding making and implementing personalized music.
- Getting started – method of providing music
- Finding their favorite music
- The process of a true music detective
- Creating a playlist
- Device considerations and storage