music and emotions

It may be clichéd to note that music is an exceptionally powerful medium for channeling strong emotions, but this cliché certainly underscores its validity when one encounters a profoundly human emotion: grief. The expression – or experience – of grief through music can follow highly normative and ritualized paths, especially during occasions like funerals. However, it can also take freer forms, seeking to push the boundaries and norms that society typically imposes on how we should experience grief.

Can music engender sorrow or comfort? Is there (a) space for grief? Emmi Kuittinen, who delves into the world of traditional laments and folk poetry for inspiration, and musician/scholar Astrid Swan, who studies grief as a personal and a transgenerational phenomenon, make music out of grief that is not as sad as one might expect.