Doctorow

Words--the vowels of words--are elongated in songs to such an extent that if you spoke the lines of a lyric, without its music but the vowels held as they are when they are sung, people would not wait to hear the end of your sentences. This is most particulary true of ballads and love songs, less so of novelty numbers or humerous songs, or songs that take exception to someone’s behavior. But it is possible that the appeal of a song lies partly in its deceleration of thought, a release perhaps from the normal race of the mind through its ideas and impressions. To ritually retard a thought is to dwell in its meaning, to find the pleasure of posed conflicts and their resolutions as you would not in a mere recitation of lyrics....

“If we sang most of the time, as they do in operas, our lives would resound, as legends, there would be very little room for new data and few occasions to genuinely advance the race, for each small thought, or change of direction each human ploy or representation of feeling, would be monumental.