What is Music For?

Recently I read about the discovery in Slovenia of a bone flute that is 60,00 years old, made by Neanderthals. Other prehistoric bone flutes that have been discovered are only 35,000 years old. On a visit to the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History I heard recordings of the sounds made by such a flute. Musical instruments of that age or earlier, made of less durable material - reeds or wood -obviously will never be discovered, but must we not assume that people were singing and also making and playing musical instruments since there were human beings?

Music has probably always had a social function - possibly its first function - in producing a shared emotional atmosphere at important social gatherings, ceremonies. Dance, rhythmic movement of the  body, is inseparable from music, part of musical experience. I imagine that people were singing, dancing, and playing instruments together from time immemorial. Music, no less than speech, is what makes us human.

One might object and argue that music has never been for anything, that it is simply itself, not functional. Or else, that functional music is an inferior type of music. I think that's wrong. Without being judgmental, we can agree that there are many different kinds of music and therefore music does many different things. In all instances, I believe, music is expressive. Of what? Of what words cannot express. That's why we need it.