If you feel like you’re getting slower as you get older, you’re not alone.
In fact, even the world’s biggest pop stars are struggling to keep up as they approach the later years of their lives, a study shows.
New analysis reveals that musicians’ songs gradually become slower as they age, including Elvis Presley, Madonna and Michael Jackson.
And rather than deliberately choosing to slow down their songs, these artists may experience a “neurobiological slowdown” later in life.
This means they are unconsciously influenced to slow down when composing their hits, the study suggests.
An analysis reveals that musicians’ songs gradually become slower as they age, including Elvis Presley, Madonna and Michael Jackson.
The researchers studied about 1,500 songs released by top-tier solo artists who had careers spanning at least two decades.
The new research was written by Geoff Luck, a musicology expert at the University of Jyväskylä in Finland.
“We saw this very clear downward trend,” he said. New Scientist.
“We are confident that the rate actually decreases over the lifespan.”
Their study focused on nearly 1,500 songs released by “top-tier” solo artists whose careers spanned at least two decades.
The artists selected were Céline Dion, Elton John, Elvis Presley, Eminem, Lil Wayne, Madonna, Mariah Carey, Michael Jackson, Shania Twain and Whitney Houston.
“By the nature of their popularity and length of their careers, these artists are arguably the most culturally significant solo artists of the popular music era,” Luck said.
The 10 recording artists (5 women and 5 men) were selected for the study because they are considered “culturally significant” with careers spanning decades.
As artists get older, they may have a level of introspection that tends to result in more melancholic or reflective songs, which tend to fit a slower pace.
Musical artists may have more energy to play the song at a faster pace when they are younger.
‘Given their stature in the industry, these artists might be expected to exert significant influence over the characteristics of the music they record, including its tempo.’
For the study, students with a musical background listened to songs from each artist’s career: 134 studio albums containing 1,497 tracks in total.
While listening to songs on Spotify, they calculated the beats per minute (BPM) using an app and entered the number into a database.
By graphing the data, the researcher found that, overall, each artist’s pace slowed over time.
Regardless of the calendar year in which an artist released an album, their output tended to slow in pace as they aged.
The effect was especially pronounced for Michael Jackson, as well as artists such as Elvis Presley, Lil Wayne, Eminem and Whitney Houston.
It was less strong, but equally significant, for artists such as Elton John, Madonna, Mariah Carey and Shania Twain.
These graphs represent the overall decline in rate over the age of each artist. Note that the effect was especially pronounced in the case of Michael Jackson, but much less strong in that of Elton John.
It was also strong for Lil Wayne and Whitney Houston, but less pronounced, though still significant, for artists like Madonna and Mariah Carey.
The findings are “surprising” because the “clear effect of age” is demonstrated in artists of different sexes and genders, says the author.
The results are consistent with the “age-deceleration” hypothesis, according to which the speed at which tasks are performed decreases as we age due to cognitive decline.
A musician releasing slower songs at a later age (compared to songs from earlier in his or her career) may be evidence of “neurobiological decline.”
“Rhythm is a critical aspect of musical performance, intimately related to the dynamics of biological movement,” Luck said in his paper.
He admits that “external factors” can affect the pace of songs, including changes in trends in listener preferences or “other market forces.”
Pictured are age-related overall rhythm declines in Celine Dion (left) and Shania Twain (right)
The artists were selected based on two criteria: they were culturally significant and their careers were long enough to reveal possible age-related effects on rhythm.
But overall, the findings have “important implications” for the music industry and studies of cognitive ability.
“Commercial recordings, millions of which are instantly accessible through a variety of streaming platforms, can offer profound insights into a fundamental and understudied aspect of human functioning across the lifespan,” the paper states.
‘These results have implications for the extent to which artists are able to shape their compositions and engage their audiences.’
The new study has been published as a preprint in bioRxiv server, meaning it has not yet been peer-reviewed.
