Many years ago, my then girlfriend showed me a website dedicated to “positive music”.
Positive music, the website said, was music without harsh, discordant sounds. It wasn’t the kind of music that arouses negative emotions. It wasn’t music to disturb or change the world. It wasn’t rap, hip-hop, hard rock or grunge. It wasn’t heavy metal. It was music for warmth, for calm and serenity, for happiness and harmony.
As far as I remember, the classification was based on the musical quality of the sounds alone. The lyrics were incidental. They even had short audio files to illustrate what kind of sounds count as positive and what don’t.
It was an interesting site and I enjoyed it. I don’t know why I remembered it a short while ago.
I tried to find it with a google search.
What I found was this site, ostensibly of the “Positive Music Association”, and full of words like these:
The PMA is about seeing music not only as entertainment but as a means of creating positive change in the world. People drawn to Positive Music often are interested in subjects like personal development and empowerment, social transformation and peace, and in creating healthy and sustainable environments, relationships and communities. We encourage artistic integrity and social responsibility.
Positive Music is not: love songs, because they do not necessarily inspire action or change; religious since they are not inclusive of all human beings, just those who prescribe to that particular religion; simply happy songs unless they inspire appreciation or action; or anti-songs (e.g. anti-war, anti-drug) unless they focus on solutions.
Somewhere in these six years, the music went out of it. Or more likely, I just didn’t find the correct site.
