“Music is the soundtrack of your life.”
Dick Clark

The definition of a musicophile is an avid lover and enthusiast of music. Point of fact, a musicophile’s passion is deeply rooted in the artistry, history, and emotional experience of the music itself. If this definition is true, I believe most people would call themselves a musicophile.

My love of all styles and types of music began as a child. There was music always playing in our home. My parents had a large collection of albums, 45s and even large reel tapes. I learned how to use the record player long before I could read.

Recently I read Oliver Sacks 2007 book, Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain. In this book, Dr. Sacks explores a range of psychological and physiological ailments and their connections to music. He wrote the book in an attempt to widen the general populace’s understanding of music and its effects on the brain. Sacks states at the outset of the book’s preface, music is omnipresent, influencing human’s everyday lives in how we think and act. 

For those of you not familiar with Dr. Sacks work, he wrote the book, Awakenings, which the 1990 feature film by the same name is based. In the book and movie he describes his medical experiences using a drug levodopa on Parkinson’s and post-encephalitic patients at the Beth Abraham Hospital, later Beth Abraham Center for Rehabilitation and Nursing, in New York.

Since the 1970s, there have been multiple studies on the benefits of music therapy for people with medical conditions, trauma, learning disabilities, and handicaps. Most of the documented studies for children have shown a positive effect in promoting self-actualization and developing receptive, cognitive, and expressive capabilities. 

For me, music can invoke a time in my life. Can invoke emotions and even the memory of pleasant scents from decades past. All this from listening to a single song.

During 2023 I published my first poetry book, Heartstrings, An Anthology From A to Z. All the poems in my book I always imagined as lyrics to songs. Then in 2026, I wrote, produced and put together a 13 track album, Dragonfly. I’ve uploaded the album to SoundCloud and will soon add the album to Spotify and Apple Music.

My life long love of music has come full circle, for this full-blown musicophile.

Shine On