Why do we like to listen to sad music? Interested in this question, the American coach and trainer Susan Kane investigated the “happiness of being sad”, the title of her latest book, published in 2022 by Éditions Leduc, which restores the power of melancholy in a society where the tyranny of positive thinking reigns. .
“When I listen to Leonard Cohen, this singer of pessimism, you can say I’m sad, but actually I feel love, a great wave of love. A deep kinship with all the other souls in the world who know the sorrow this music is trying to convey.”, he explains in the introduction. Bittersweet songs comfort us because they allow us to feel connected to one another, all united in a common humanity.
Many musical genres are thus based on a certain nostalgia: Portuguese fado, Spanish flamenco, American blues… Helping us to get rid of our negative emotions, this music…
Source: Le Figaro
