Choose your dog’s music wisely.
What kind of music do dogs like best? What kind of music calms them down? What kind winds them up?
Dr. Becker has reported on several studies of dogs and music (https://www.barkandwhiskers.com/2023-11-03-music-calming-for-dogs/)
It’s classical music, hands-down: that’s the music for your dog. In one of the studies, 85% of the dogs tested found classical music to be the most calming. Solo piano pieces, solo harp selections, and soft rock also scored high.
At the other end of the scale, heavy metal music made the dogs antsy and provoked a lot of nervous barking. Bark if you’re surprised. Like we needed a scientific study to tell us heavy metal is lousy music.
Anyway, the tests were done at veterinary hospitals and animal shelters, on up to 50 dogs at a time, and the results were quite consistent. I don’t like that yelling-and-screaming pseudo-music any more than dogs do. But see what A Little Night Music by Mozart can do. Or maybe some Liberace, if you remember him.
[I seem to remember, quite a few years ago, reading about a study that showed plants (!) responding well to classical music. Does that ring a bell with anybody?]