Jun 10, 2025
How Quickly Can Music Improve Mood? Finding Your Ideal “Dose”
How Quickly Can Music Improve Mood? Finding Your Ideal “Dose”
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Here at Spiritune, we talk a lot about the power of music to alter mood. When you’re feeling stressed, overwhelmed, or anxious, listening to music can help take your mind off these emotions and encourage your body to relax.
One natural follow-up question we often get is: How quickly does this happen? How long do you need to listen to music before it can improve your mood? The answer isn’t so cut-and-dried; it largely depends on the person, music, and context. In honor of Mental Health Awareness Month, we’re sharing the nuanced research on how much music to listen to at a time for maximum, lasting stress reduction benefits.
Clocking music’s impacts
Before we dig into the ideal “dose,” let’s review the pathways through which music relieves stress.
First off, listening to pleasurable music engages brain regions associated with reward, motivation, and emotions. For the neurology-curious: The ventral striatum, midbrain, amygdala, orbitofrontal, and ventral medial prefrontal cortices have all been implicated in the listening experience. Once a song or musical track reaches its peak intensity, it can trigger the release of dopamine in the brain, contributing to feelings of pleasure, satisfaction, and enjoyment.
Music-evoked positive emotions can help counter the negative emotions brought on by stress, and there are a few theories on why. For starters, music may act as an “anchor” that draws our attention away from ruminative, repetitive thoughts. Some studies have also found that listening to music can decrease elevated cortisol levels following a stressor compared to silence or non-musical controls (think: the sound of rippling water).
An analysis of 104 randomized controlled trials, published in 2019, concluded that music can not only ease the emotions associated with stress, but the physical sensations of stress as well.
Music listening is known to cause changes in heart rate, respiratory rate, blood pressure, and muscle tension due in part to the process of entrainment. Entrainment happens when our bodies’ rhythms begin to synchronize with the rhythms of music.
Research on musical entrainment shows that it happens relatively quickly. In one study, classical music influenced people’s heart rate variability (HRV) within just three minutes of listening.
This suggests that some of the effects of music listening happen nearly instantly, but these may be too subtle to pick up on (after all, you can’t feel your HRV going up and down).
As for how long it takes for music to contribute to noticeable changes in mood, estimates vary—but one fascinating study found that 20 minutes seems to be a threshold.
Published in the International Journal of Behavioral Medicine in 2017, this study prompted 60 undergraduate students to report on their music listening habits in real time. Every day for a week, students consented to having their music activities tracked (via an iPod or smartphone). At random intervals throughout the day, they were prompted to answer questions about their stress, mood, and music listening behavior as they went about their usual routine.
This was an “ambulatory assessment,” meaning it studied individuals in their natural environments instead of in a lab to get a sense of real-life behaviors.
After crunching the numbers, researchers found that participants reported significantly higher stress levels when they had recently listened to music for less than 5 minutes. Listening to music for more than 20 minutes was associated with lower stress reports, suggesting this could be a sweet spot for maximum benefits.
What type of music is best?
To recap, research suggests that our bodies tend to “sync” to the music we listen to within a few minutes, but listening to music for at least 20 minutes at a time has been associated with stress reduction benefits.
That said, everyone is different! The preferences, emotions, and memories you bring to the experience of listening no doubt impact the way that music impacts you on any given day.
Certain types of music also seem to be more effective at relieving stress than others. This was beautifully demonstrated in a qualitative study on seven young people (19–28 years old) suffering from depression. Researchers interviewed participants about the type of music they listened to when they were in a low mood.
“When participants listened to music that mirrored their current circumstances, this appeared to have less desirable mood outcomes, possibly because listening to such music is akin to ruminating,” researchers concluded. On the other hand, listening to more upbeat or optimistic music was found to offer a distraction from depressive thoughts, albeit a brief one.
Some combination of the two—music that matches one’s negative mood and then gradually transitions to become more positive—seems to be most effective for lasting relief.
Take this 2021 study, in which healthy adults watched a sad movie clip before listening to two pieces of music. The music fell into the buckets of: sad-sad, sad-happy, happy-happy, and happy-sad. “The group of participants who listened to the sad music first and the happy music afterwards ultimately reported a higher positive affect, a higher emotional valence, and a lower negative affect compared with the other groups,” researchers found.
Now, to put these findings into practice: The next time you’re feeling stressed or down, try playing music that matches your current mood before transitioning into a more positive rhythm and structure. Listen for at least 20 minutes and repeat as needed throughout the day.
Spiritune is an ideal ally for this type of targeted musical intervention. Our tracks are designed using principles of neuroscience and music therapy to gradually guide listeners from their current mood to their desired mood state. Once you press play on a track, it will continue for as long as you need. Whether your journey to calm takes two minutes or twenty, we’re so happy to help guide the way.
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Jul 16, 2026
These Morning Tracks Are Basically a Cup of Coffee For the Brain
Our top five tips for the ultimate morning playlist: How to use music to unlock energy and focus:
While some lucky people seem to wake up with endless energy, most of us need to call in some liquid support in the mornings. Caffeine works by blocking certain brain receptors associated with drowsiness. But while it puts off yawns temporarily, caffeine doesn’t necessarily give us more energy—and it can compound fatigue in the long run (say, if we drink it too close to bedtime and disrupt our sleep).
Coffee or a caffeinated tea are great options for busy mornings, but it’s also worth trying other energizing strategies to help round out their effects. Enter: music! Music has its own stimulating impact on the brain and, when selected intentionally, can supply a mental boost and fight fatigue—without the jitters or crash. Here’s the science behind using music to unlock energy, and how to curate the perfect playlist to power your mornings.
Listening to music first thing in the morning can start the day on a high note.
Every time you press play on a song, you activate networks of your brain associated with memory, emotion, expectation, and reward. Depending on the type of music you’re listening to, your brain can respond by releasing certain chemicals that support energy and pleasure.
Let’s start with oxytocin: Music is known to increase levels of oxytocin in the brain and body—the same “love hormone” that helps forge bonds between a mother and child. Daniel Bowling, Ph.D., Spiritune advisor and a leading expert in the neuroscience of music, notes that this helps explain why listening to music with other people can prompt feelings of connection. Oxytocin also helps buffer the body’s stress response, helping us start the day on the right foot.
When you listen to a song you enjoy, your brain also releases dopamine, the “pleasure hormone,” as the track reaches its musical peak. Dopamine interacts with some of the same brain infrastructure as caffeine, causing researchers to suspect that listening to music may reduce perceived exertion and restore motivation, making us feel like we have more energy and focus. (Though your personal relationship to the music makes a big difference here—more on why below.)
Our bodies also tend to synchronize with the rhythm and tempo of music in a process known as entrainment. A landmark paper on musical neurodynamics notes that music’s temporal elements can subtly influence our heart rate, emotions, and body movements. In other words, we physically embody musical structure. From this perspective, it makes sense that “high-arousal” music (e.g., songs with faster tempos and more complex rhythms) may help us get over the hump of morning fatigue.
While research directly investigating how music impacts energy levels first thing in the morning is limited, one study on 50 participants did find that waking up to melodic sounds seemed to ease perceived sleep inertia—the grogginess participants felt after waking—more than less melodic alarms.
Though more research is needed, music does come with some energizing, mood-boosting (and side-effect-free!) benefits that may make for an easier wake-up. As the morning goes on, it can also go a long way in keeping the mind sharp.
Later in the morning, music is a great companion for cognitively draining tasks.
As the morning progresses, many people need another pick-me-up to get through cognitively demanding tasks at work or at home. We all know the feeling of mental stupor that can cause us to reach for a second (or third… or fourth) cup of coffee. Though researchers aren’t exactly sure what causes mental fatigue symptoms, they suspect that after prolonged periods of focused thinking, certain molecules like glutamate might build up and negatively affect brain cell function.
Music seems to offer an antidote by taking our mind off the task at hand, helping reduce the effort and mental exertion we think we need to put into it. In a science review called Does music counteract mental fatigue? authors note that a few different categories of music seem to help counteract brain strain: relaxing music, exciting music, and music that we personally really enjoy. When it comes to impacting cognition, not every type of tune will do the trick.
Case in point: In research published last year, a group of healthy adults across the U.S. was asked to listen to one of four types of audio for 10 minutes: A Spiritune track, Spotify’s “Deep Focus” playlist, pop music from the Hot 100, or office noises. After the listening session, their mood was assessed and their cognitive speed was tested.
Spiritune’s Work Flow music was found to significantly improve participants’ positive affect (e.g., feelings of strength, enthusiasm, and determination) and decrease negative affect (e.g., feelings of stress, anxiety, and irritation) to a 4x greater degree than the other music conditions. People also scored higher on processing speed after listening to Spiritune—without losing accuracy. In fact, Spiritune music was the only music condition to improve this cognitive functionality.
In reflecting on what set Spiritune apart, study co-author Pablo Ripollés, Ph.D. says, "What we think is happening is this music is likable so it’s making people feel better and also it’s keeping people engaged because it has this groove.” It was likely the combination of strong groove, a slightly faster tempo, and minimal distracting elements (no lyrics) that helped promote energy and focus in this case.
Tips for perfecting your morning playlist
To wrap things up, are the main ingredients for an energizing morning playlist based on research:
Choose energetic music for an energetic morning.
Since your body tends to synchronize with certain rhythmic qualities of the music you listen to, tracks that are faster and more energetic may speed up your mornings.
Conversely, Concetta Tomaino, Spiritune’s Music Therapy Advisor, notes that soothing, slow rhythms can reduce heart rate and lower anxiety, making them useful for times when you want to enter a calmer headspace (like right before bed).
… But be sure it’s something you like.
Your personal preferences play a major role in how music moves you. It doesn’t matter how upbeat and fast-tempo a track is: If you don’t like it, it won’t have as much of a positive effect on you. “Whether [a song is] therapeutic or not depends on the composer and on the listener,” Bowling says.
Music that you are familiar with or that follows a recognizable, repeating pattern also tends to engage brain centers associated with expectation and reward. When you can anticipate where a song is headed next, and then it goes there, your brain responds by rewarding that successful prediction with a small surge of pleasure hormones. Learn more about the concept of musical reward here.
Find music that will wake up with you.
The iso principle is a core concept in music therapy that states that listening to music that matches your current mood or physiological state and then gradually transitions into your desired state seems to be most effective. Following this logic, you may want to ease into your morning by starting with softer, slower music that gets progressively faster, louder, or more upbeat.
Pair your music with coffee and other sensory treats.
Individually, music, coffee, and tea are a few of life’s great pleasures. And together, they may be even better! A study published in 2023 found that combining music with caffeine improved peak power during exercise compared with music alone.
There’s also science to show that certain aromas can enhance energy and cognitive function. Consider building a morning routine that engages all the senses with strong coffee, zippy essential oils, and a great playlist.
Download Spiritune to let us do the curating for you.
Spiritune takes all the guesswork out of choosing music to move your mood. Our ‘Waking Up’ tracks leverage principles of neuroscience and music therapy to help listeners reach their goals quickly.
Simply choose your starting mood and desired mindset (i.e., joyful, determined, excited, victorious) to set your personalized morning playlist into motion. Depending on your starting point, tracks will begin on the slower and more contemplative side, with an almost dreamy quality. As the beat comes in, your mind will get a little more tuned up and engaged. Then, you’ll be carried into a soundscape that is vibrant and energetic without being distracting.
And as the morning progresses, Spiritune can become the ultimate sidekick for focused work, as demonstrated by the controlled trial on its cognitive benefits compared to other types of audio.
Give our ‘Waking Up’ tracks a try to see why Spiritune wins out over the snooze button.
Like what you're reading? Sign up for Spiritune’s newsletter to get a monthly music therapy download straight to your inbox. Haven’t tried Spiritune yet? Download it today with a free trial!
Jun 24, 2026
What World Cup Anthems Teach Us About the Brain's Reward System
The World Cup is here to fill your summer with passion, heartbreak—and a mood-boosting playlist. Here’s how sport songs and anthems impact the brain, from a neuroscientist. —————
Olé, Olé, Olé!
Since the first World Cup was held in Uruguay in 1930, rhythm, chanting, and song have been central to the games.
Back in those early days, it took weeks for teams to travel to the competition by boat, and they supposedly passed the time by listening to onboard musical acts. Players were welcomed to those inaugural games at Centenario Stadium to the tune of "Uruguayos Campeones” (Uruguay Champions), widely considered the first official World Cup anthem.
Since then, many tracks written for the tournament—from “Waka Waka" by Shakira and “Wavin’ Flag” by K’Naan—have impacted pop culture and unified fans around the world. This year, music will play an even greater role in the games, and there will be a musical halftime show during the final match for the first time.
Sound is a way to strengthen collective identity, build anticipation, and flood the body with feel-good hormones. Here’s the science behind music’s connection to sports—and what it teaches us about the brain’s reward system.
Why Music is Played at Every Major Sporting Event
Head to any sporting match and you’ll likely hear music before players walk out, during timeouts, and at the game’s conclusion. Crowds will also chime in with coordinated chants, cheers, and team anthems—collective soundtracks that speak to music’s ability to bring people together.
“[Sports music] is essentially a social bonding thing. It’s a way to connect and synchronize ourselves,” says Daniel Bowling, Ph.D., Spiritune Scientific Co-Founder and a leading expert in the neuroscience of music.
Bowling explains that when fans sing together, they become synchronized not just behaviorally, but physiologically and emotionally.
When people engage in music together, their heart rates, breathing patterns, and movements tend to sync up. These subconscious reactions can lead to what’s known as self-other merging, which Bowling describes as “the dissolution of boundaries.”
“It’s when you start to act and behave in the same way as everybody else around you. You're joining together, and you're losing your individualism, in a sense,” he adds. Research shows that this merging is a key ingredient of social bonding.
In social settings, music can also simulate the production of oxytocin, the hormone of attachment that may further strengthen feelings of affiliation with those around us.
It’s easy to see why sporting events, which are often stressful and emotionally taxing occasions, rely on music to build camaraderie. By connecting to rhythm, sports fans also connect to each other.
Where Musical Reward Comes In
Beyond syncing us up with others, music can also connect us to ourselves and our emotions. The concept of “musical reward” describes how music stimulates our brain’s internal reward system in a similar way to other biological rewards, such as food.
Bowling explains that researchers have studied this reward primarily by asking people to describe how certain songs make them feel and, more recently, by analyzing brain activity while music is playing.
Music that is pleasing, familiar, or follows a predictable rhythm seems to be most likely to evoke a positive response in the brain and body. If we anticipate what’s going to happen next in an anthem or chant, and then those expectations are met, the brain is more likely to reward us with feel-good hormones like dopamine. Some people may even tear up, get the chills, or feel almost euphoric as a result.
In this way, neuroscience helps explain why so many beloved sports anthems follow a predictable pattern: Their repetition is pleasing to the brain, and it may be more emotionally salient for a bigger group of fans.
Reaping Music’s Rewards Outside the Stadium
Rhythm is one of the most important musical elements for triggering positive responses in the brain, Bowling explains. “It doesn’t necessarily need to have a drum beat, but it needs to be systematically structured in time so people can follow it,” he says.
Similar to a moving song after a late-in-the-game goal, Spiritune’s music can activate the brain's pleasure and reward pathways. Each Spiritune track is composed using precise parameters for rhythm and groove. These sonic components are combined with tenets of music therapy to create music tailored to the listener’s goals—whether it’s to feel more energized, sleep better, or turn the mood around after a tough loss in the Knockout Stage.
We also pride ourselves on creating music that is broadly accessible and appealing to people with different backgrounds and preferences. Each track showcases the unifying elements of music to help listeners feel better quickly.
Even after Shakira, Madonna, and BTS sing their last halftime note and this year’s World Cup festivities end, Spiritune will allow the camaraderie, emotional resonance, and reward of music to stay at your fingertips.
Like what you're reading? Sign up for Spiritune’s newsletter to get a monthly music therapy download straight to your inbox. Haven’t tried Spiritune yet? Download it today with a free trial!
May 28, 2026
How Music Promotes Mental Health Around the World
Music goes hand in hand with culture. It’s long served as a tool to share stories, celebrate victories, and call for change. One of the few types of expressions that transcends language, it remains an invisible string that connects people around the world.
Music’s power is universal, but each place has its own way to share it. Today, we’re traveling the globe to explore a few moving examples of expression through sound. Read through to learn about the history, significance, and meaning behind each one, or just press play and let the tunes do the talking.
The sweeping stories of ‘pansori’ in South Korea
Pansori is a traditional Korean practice that pairs singing with the spoken word. In a typical performance, one drummer and one vocalist work together to express an emotional, rhythmic story on stage.
To reach a passionate, emotional timbre, pansori vocalists look to nature as a teacher. Some are said to spend weeks studying in the mountains, singing next to waterfalls to emulate the waters’ sonic intensity in their storytelling.
“Pansori vocalization amplifies the dramatic effect of every single object and character surrounding the story," said Ahn Sook Sun, one of South Korea’s most renowned pansori performers. Storylines often touch on themes of love, sacrifice, and honor, exploring the human conditions in ways that are moving and cathartic for audiences.
Learn more and watch a performance here.
The science-backed soundscapes of ‘forest bathing’ in Japan
Shinrin-yoku, or forest bathing, originated in Japan as a way to help overworked city dwellers unwind in the natural world. Doctors began to study the impacts of slow, mindful forest walking on people’s physical and mental health in the 1980s, and have since concluded that it can reduce stress while measurably improving sleep quality and immunity. These days, there are over 50 forest therapy bases throughout Japan where people can go to benefit from Shinrin-yoku alongside a certified guide.
Shinrin-yoku differs from a typical walk or hike because of its emphasis on the five senses, with sound playing a major role in the experience. Guides will often prompt people to close their eyes and give the forest’s soundscape their full attention, honing in on how different songs of the outdoors make them feel. There’s a range of research to suggest that nature soundscapes are uniquely restorative, and just listening to an audio recording of forest environments seems to be enough to have a calming effect on the body and mind.
Immerse yourself in the sounds of the forest here.
The meditative tones of ‘ragas’ in India
The English translation of raga is “color,” and this Indian classical music is thought to paint the mind with different emotional hues. Each note is intentional, with certain tones corresponding to particular times of the day or year. Raga Yaman is a serene evening melody, for example, while Raga Desh is romantic and associated with the rainy season. Raga music can be played with a variety of instruments, including the sitar, tabla (hand drums), and bansuri (flute).
“Many raags [ragas] are designed to work like a prescription, enhancing a particular mood, time of day, season, emotion or ambience,” writer Jameela Siddiqi noted in Darbar, an Indian classical music platform.
Modern science continues to validate the ancient music’s power, with EEG recordings showing that just a few minutes of listening to ragas evokes feelings of joy and calmness, or sadness and tension, in listeners.
Listen to a moving morning raga here.
The enduring spiritual power of ‘Gnawa’ music in Morocco
Gnawa is a spirited and expressive type of Moroccan music with roots in the 16th century. Named for the Gnawa people, who arrived in Morocco by way of West Africa, it was traditionally played during healing ceremonies to evoke and communicate with spirits and ancestors. Today, it retains a deep cultural significance in the country, where master practitioners share Gnawa—a United Nations Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity practice—with the next generation.
It combines chanting and traditional instruments, such as the guembri (a three-stringed lute) and the qraqeb (a metal castanet). Songs use repetitive rhythms to evoke a trance-like state. As one listener described to CBS, attending a performance is "like being on the edge of time.”
Watch a NYC-based Gnawa group, Innov Gnawa, perform here.
The grounding quality of the ‘six healing sounds’ in China
In Traditional Chinese Medicine, the six healing sounds are vocalizations meant to energize different organs in the body. The practice of Qigong combines these sounds with breathwork and gentle movement in order to calm the nervous system and clear energetic blocks. Dating back to roughly the 5th century AD, it’s one of the oldest sonic practices in the world.
Watch a demonstration of the practice here.
While musical traditions may sound vastly different around the world, many of the elements that make music emotionally powerful are surprisingly universal. Across cultures, humans respond to core acoustic features like rhythm, tempo, tonal simplicity, repetition, and dynamic shifts in remarkably similar ways.
At Spiritune, our compositions are designed around these universal principles.
Drawing from neuroscience and music therapy research, we intentionally use tonal, rhythmic, and energetic elements shown to support relaxation, focus, emotional regulation, and more across diverse populations. Rather than relying on genre or personal taste, our approach focuses on the underlying acoustic qualities of music that the human brain and body naturally respond to.
“Music may differ across cultures, but the emotional and physiological mechanisms behind how humans respond to sound are deeply shared,” says Jamie Pabst, founder and CEO of Spiritune. “At Spiritune, we’re inspired by musical traditions around the world and use universal acoustic principles to create therapeutic music experiences that can help people feel better no matter where they’re from.”
In many ways, music has always been one of humanity’s oldest forms of medicine — a universal language capable of connecting us not only to our cultures, but also to ourselves.
Like what you're reading? Sign up for Spiritune’s newsletter to get a monthly music therapy download straight to your inbox. Haven’t tried Spiritune yet? Download it today with a free trial!
Jul 16, 2026
These Morning Tracks Are Basically a Cup of Coffee For the Brain
Our top five tips for the ultimate morning playlist: How to use music to unlock energy and focus:
While some lucky people seem to wake up with endless energy, most of us need to call in some liquid support in the mornings. Caffeine works by blocking certain brain receptors associated with drowsiness. But while it puts off yawns temporarily, caffeine doesn’t necessarily give us more energy—and it can compound fatigue in the long run (say, if we drink it too close to bedtime and disrupt our sleep).
Coffee or a caffeinated tea are great options for busy mornings, but it’s also worth trying other energizing strategies to help round out their effects. Enter: music! Music has its own stimulating impact on the brain and, when selected intentionally, can supply a mental boost and fight fatigue—without the jitters or crash. Here’s the science behind using music to unlock energy, and how to curate the perfect playlist to power your mornings.
Listening to music first thing in the morning can start the day on a high note.
Every time you press play on a song, you activate networks of your brain associated with memory, emotion, expectation, and reward. Depending on the type of music you’re listening to, your brain can respond by releasing certain chemicals that support energy and pleasure.
Let’s start with oxytocin: Music is known to increase levels of oxytocin in the brain and body—the same “love hormone” that helps forge bonds between a mother and child. Daniel Bowling, Ph.D., Spiritune advisor and a leading expert in the neuroscience of music, notes that this helps explain why listening to music with other people can prompt feelings of connection. Oxytocin also helps buffer the body’s stress response, helping us start the day on the right foot.
When you listen to a song you enjoy, your brain also releases dopamine, the “pleasure hormone,” as the track reaches its musical peak. Dopamine interacts with some of the same brain infrastructure as caffeine, causing researchers to suspect that listening to music may reduce perceived exertion and restore motivation, making us feel like we have more energy and focus. (Though your personal relationship to the music makes a big difference here—more on why below.)
Our bodies also tend to synchronize with the rhythm and tempo of music in a process known as entrainment. A landmark paper on musical neurodynamics notes that music’s temporal elements can subtly influence our heart rate, emotions, and body movements. In other words, we physically embody musical structure. From this perspective, it makes sense that “high-arousal” music (e.g., songs with faster tempos and more complex rhythms) may help us get over the hump of morning fatigue.
While research directly investigating how music impacts energy levels first thing in the morning is limited, one study on 50 participants did find that waking up to melodic sounds seemed to ease perceived sleep inertia—the grogginess participants felt after waking—more than less melodic alarms.
Though more research is needed, music does come with some energizing, mood-boosting (and side-effect-free!) benefits that may make for an easier wake-up. As the morning goes on, it can also go a long way in keeping the mind sharp.
Later in the morning, music is a great companion for cognitively draining tasks.
As the morning progresses, many people need another pick-me-up to get through cognitively demanding tasks at work or at home. We all know the feeling of mental stupor that can cause us to reach for a second (or third… or fourth) cup of coffee. Though researchers aren’t exactly sure what causes mental fatigue symptoms, they suspect that after prolonged periods of focused thinking, certain molecules like glutamate might build up and negatively affect brain cell function.
Music seems to offer an antidote by taking our mind off the task at hand, helping reduce the effort and mental exertion we think we need to put into it. In a science review called Does music counteract mental fatigue? authors note that a few different categories of music seem to help counteract brain strain: relaxing music, exciting music, and music that we personally really enjoy. When it comes to impacting cognition, not every type of tune will do the trick.
Case in point: In research published last year, a group of healthy adults across the U.S. was asked to listen to one of four types of audio for 10 minutes: A Spiritune track, Spotify’s “Deep Focus” playlist, pop music from the Hot 100, or office noises. After the listening session, their mood was assessed and their cognitive speed was tested.
Spiritune’s Work Flow music was found to significantly improve participants’ positive affect (e.g., feelings of strength, enthusiasm, and determination) and decrease negative affect (e.g., feelings of stress, anxiety, and irritation) to a 4x greater degree than the other music conditions. People also scored higher on processing speed after listening to Spiritune—without losing accuracy. In fact, Spiritune music was the only music condition to improve this cognitive functionality.
In reflecting on what set Spiritune apart, study co-author Pablo Ripollés, Ph.D. says, "What we think is happening is this music is likable so it’s making people feel better and also it’s keeping people engaged because it has this groove.” It was likely the combination of strong groove, a slightly faster tempo, and minimal distracting elements (no lyrics) that helped promote energy and focus in this case.
Tips for perfecting your morning playlist
To wrap things up, are the main ingredients for an energizing morning playlist based on research:
Choose energetic music for an energetic morning.
Since your body tends to synchronize with certain rhythmic qualities of the music you listen to, tracks that are faster and more energetic may speed up your mornings.
Conversely, Concetta Tomaino, Spiritune’s Music Therapy Advisor, notes that soothing, slow rhythms can reduce heart rate and lower anxiety, making them useful for times when you want to enter a calmer headspace (like right before bed).
… But be sure it’s something you like.
Your personal preferences play a major role in how music moves you. It doesn’t matter how upbeat and fast-tempo a track is: If you don’t like it, it won’t have as much of a positive effect on you. “Whether [a song is] therapeutic or not depends on the composer and on the listener,” Bowling says.
Music that you are familiar with or that follows a recognizable, repeating pattern also tends to engage brain centers associated with expectation and reward. When you can anticipate where a song is headed next, and then it goes there, your brain responds by rewarding that successful prediction with a small surge of pleasure hormones. Learn more about the concept of musical reward here.
Find music that will wake up with you.
The iso principle is a core concept in music therapy that states that listening to music that matches your current mood or physiological state and then gradually transitions into your desired state seems to be most effective. Following this logic, you may want to ease into your morning by starting with softer, slower music that gets progressively faster, louder, or more upbeat.
Pair your music with coffee and other sensory treats.
Individually, music, coffee, and tea are a few of life’s great pleasures. And together, they may be even better! A study published in 2023 found that combining music with caffeine improved peak power during exercise compared with music alone.
There’s also science to show that certain aromas can enhance energy and cognitive function. Consider building a morning routine that engages all the senses with strong coffee, zippy essential oils, and a great playlist.
Download Spiritune to let us do the curating for you.
Spiritune takes all the guesswork out of choosing music to move your mood. Our ‘Waking Up’ tracks leverage principles of neuroscience and music therapy to help listeners reach their goals quickly.
Simply choose your starting mood and desired mindset (i.e., joyful, determined, excited, victorious) to set your personalized morning playlist into motion. Depending on your starting point, tracks will begin on the slower and more contemplative side, with an almost dreamy quality. As the beat comes in, your mind will get a little more tuned up and engaged. Then, you’ll be carried into a soundscape that is vibrant and energetic without being distracting.
And as the morning progresses, Spiritune can become the ultimate sidekick for focused work, as demonstrated by the controlled trial on its cognitive benefits compared to other types of audio.
Give our ‘Waking Up’ tracks a try to see why Spiritune wins out over the snooze button.
Like what you're reading? Sign up for Spiritune’s newsletter to get a monthly music therapy download straight to your inbox. Haven’t tried Spiritune yet? Download it today with a free trial!
Jun 24, 2026
What World Cup Anthems Teach Us About the Brain's Reward System
The World Cup is here to fill your summer with passion, heartbreak—and a mood-boosting playlist. Here’s how sport songs and anthems impact the brain, from a neuroscientist. —————
Olé, Olé, Olé!
Since the first World Cup was held in Uruguay in 1930, rhythm, chanting, and song have been central to the games.
Back in those early days, it took weeks for teams to travel to the competition by boat, and they supposedly passed the time by listening to onboard musical acts. Players were welcomed to those inaugural games at Centenario Stadium to the tune of "Uruguayos Campeones” (Uruguay Champions), widely considered the first official World Cup anthem.
Since then, many tracks written for the tournament—from “Waka Waka" by Shakira and “Wavin’ Flag” by K’Naan—have impacted pop culture and unified fans around the world. This year, music will play an even greater role in the games, and there will be a musical halftime show during the final match for the first time.
Sound is a way to strengthen collective identity, build anticipation, and flood the body with feel-good hormones. Here’s the science behind music’s connection to sports—and what it teaches us about the brain’s reward system.
Why Music is Played at Every Major Sporting Event
Head to any sporting match and you’ll likely hear music before players walk out, during timeouts, and at the game’s conclusion. Crowds will also chime in with coordinated chants, cheers, and team anthems—collective soundtracks that speak to music’s ability to bring people together.
“[Sports music] is essentially a social bonding thing. It’s a way to connect and synchronize ourselves,” says Daniel Bowling, Ph.D., Spiritune Scientific Co-Founder and a leading expert in the neuroscience of music.
Bowling explains that when fans sing together, they become synchronized not just behaviorally, but physiologically and emotionally.
When people engage in music together, their heart rates, breathing patterns, and movements tend to sync up. These subconscious reactions can lead to what’s known as self-other merging, which Bowling describes as “the dissolution of boundaries.”
“It’s when you start to act and behave in the same way as everybody else around you. You're joining together, and you're losing your individualism, in a sense,” he adds. Research shows that this merging is a key ingredient of social bonding.
In social settings, music can also simulate the production of oxytocin, the hormone of attachment that may further strengthen feelings of affiliation with those around us.
It’s easy to see why sporting events, which are often stressful and emotionally taxing occasions, rely on music to build camaraderie. By connecting to rhythm, sports fans also connect to each other.
Where Musical Reward Comes In
Beyond syncing us up with others, music can also connect us to ourselves and our emotions. The concept of “musical reward” describes how music stimulates our brain’s internal reward system in a similar way to other biological rewards, such as food.
Bowling explains that researchers have studied this reward primarily by asking people to describe how certain songs make them feel and, more recently, by analyzing brain activity while music is playing.
Music that is pleasing, familiar, or follows a predictable rhythm seems to be most likely to evoke a positive response in the brain and body. If we anticipate what’s going to happen next in an anthem or chant, and then those expectations are met, the brain is more likely to reward us with feel-good hormones like dopamine. Some people may even tear up, get the chills, or feel almost euphoric as a result.
In this way, neuroscience helps explain why so many beloved sports anthems follow a predictable pattern: Their repetition is pleasing to the brain, and it may be more emotionally salient for a bigger group of fans.
Reaping Music’s Rewards Outside the Stadium
Rhythm is one of the most important musical elements for triggering positive responses in the brain, Bowling explains. “It doesn’t necessarily need to have a drum beat, but it needs to be systematically structured in time so people can follow it,” he says.
Similar to a moving song after a late-in-the-game goal, Spiritune’s music can activate the brain's pleasure and reward pathways. Each Spiritune track is composed using precise parameters for rhythm and groove. These sonic components are combined with tenets of music therapy to create music tailored to the listener’s goals—whether it’s to feel more energized, sleep better, or turn the mood around after a tough loss in the Knockout Stage.
We also pride ourselves on creating music that is broadly accessible and appealing to people with different backgrounds and preferences. Each track showcases the unifying elements of music to help listeners feel better quickly.
Even after Shakira, Madonna, and BTS sing their last halftime note and this year’s World Cup festivities end, Spiritune will allow the camaraderie, emotional resonance, and reward of music to stay at your fingertips.
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May 28, 2026
How Music Promotes Mental Health Around the World
Music goes hand in hand with culture. It’s long served as a tool to share stories, celebrate victories, and call for change. One of the few types of expressions that transcends language, it remains an invisible string that connects people around the world.
Music’s power is universal, but each place has its own way to share it. Today, we’re traveling the globe to explore a few moving examples of expression through sound. Read through to learn about the history, significance, and meaning behind each one, or just press play and let the tunes do the talking.
The sweeping stories of ‘pansori’ in South Korea
Pansori is a traditional Korean practice that pairs singing with the spoken word. In a typical performance, one drummer and one vocalist work together to express an emotional, rhythmic story on stage.
To reach a passionate, emotional timbre, pansori vocalists look to nature as a teacher. Some are said to spend weeks studying in the mountains, singing next to waterfalls to emulate the waters’ sonic intensity in their storytelling.
“Pansori vocalization amplifies the dramatic effect of every single object and character surrounding the story," said Ahn Sook Sun, one of South Korea’s most renowned pansori performers. Storylines often touch on themes of love, sacrifice, and honor, exploring the human conditions in ways that are moving and cathartic for audiences.
Learn more and watch a performance here.
The science-backed soundscapes of ‘forest bathing’ in Japan
Shinrin-yoku, or forest bathing, originated in Japan as a way to help overworked city dwellers unwind in the natural world. Doctors began to study the impacts of slow, mindful forest walking on people’s physical and mental health in the 1980s, and have since concluded that it can reduce stress while measurably improving sleep quality and immunity. These days, there are over 50 forest therapy bases throughout Japan where people can go to benefit from Shinrin-yoku alongside a certified guide.
Shinrin-yoku differs from a typical walk or hike because of its emphasis on the five senses, with sound playing a major role in the experience. Guides will often prompt people to close their eyes and give the forest’s soundscape their full attention, honing in on how different songs of the outdoors make them feel. There’s a range of research to suggest that nature soundscapes are uniquely restorative, and just listening to an audio recording of forest environments seems to be enough to have a calming effect on the body and mind.
Immerse yourself in the sounds of the forest here.
The meditative tones of ‘ragas’ in India
The English translation of raga is “color,” and this Indian classical music is thought to paint the mind with different emotional hues. Each note is intentional, with certain tones corresponding to particular times of the day or year. Raga Yaman is a serene evening melody, for example, while Raga Desh is romantic and associated with the rainy season. Raga music can be played with a variety of instruments, including the sitar, tabla (hand drums), and bansuri (flute).
“Many raags [ragas] are designed to work like a prescription, enhancing a particular mood, time of day, season, emotion or ambience,” writer Jameela Siddiqi noted in Darbar, an Indian classical music platform.
Modern science continues to validate the ancient music’s power, with EEG recordings showing that just a few minutes of listening to ragas evokes feelings of joy and calmness, or sadness and tension, in listeners.
Listen to a moving morning raga here.
The enduring spiritual power of ‘Gnawa’ music in Morocco
Gnawa is a spirited and expressive type of Moroccan music with roots in the 16th century. Named for the Gnawa people, who arrived in Morocco by way of West Africa, it was traditionally played during healing ceremonies to evoke and communicate with spirits and ancestors. Today, it retains a deep cultural significance in the country, where master practitioners share Gnawa—a United Nations Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity practice—with the next generation.
It combines chanting and traditional instruments, such as the guembri (a three-stringed lute) and the qraqeb (a metal castanet). Songs use repetitive rhythms to evoke a trance-like state. As one listener described to CBS, attending a performance is "like being on the edge of time.”
Watch a NYC-based Gnawa group, Innov Gnawa, perform here.
The grounding quality of the ‘six healing sounds’ in China
In Traditional Chinese Medicine, the six healing sounds are vocalizations meant to energize different organs in the body. The practice of Qigong combines these sounds with breathwork and gentle movement in order to calm the nervous system and clear energetic blocks. Dating back to roughly the 5th century AD, it’s one of the oldest sonic practices in the world.
Watch a demonstration of the practice here.
While musical traditions may sound vastly different around the world, many of the elements that make music emotionally powerful are surprisingly universal. Across cultures, humans respond to core acoustic features like rhythm, tempo, tonal simplicity, repetition, and dynamic shifts in remarkably similar ways.
At Spiritune, our compositions are designed around these universal principles.
Drawing from neuroscience and music therapy research, we intentionally use tonal, rhythmic, and energetic elements shown to support relaxation, focus, emotional regulation, and more across diverse populations. Rather than relying on genre or personal taste, our approach focuses on the underlying acoustic qualities of music that the human brain and body naturally respond to.
“Music may differ across cultures, but the emotional and physiological mechanisms behind how humans respond to sound are deeply shared,” says Jamie Pabst, founder and CEO of Spiritune. “At Spiritune, we’re inspired by musical traditions around the world and use universal acoustic principles to create therapeutic music experiences that can help people feel better no matter where they’re from.”
In many ways, music has always been one of humanity’s oldest forms of medicine — a universal language capable of connecting us not only to our cultures, but also to ourselves.
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