Of the many trends you stumble across on TikTok, ‘cows love jazz’ could be one of the quirkiest!
Yup, it’s true. Search for the term and you’ll find videos, some with millions of views, where people play relaxing jazz tunes to a field of cows. The animals seem to love it and trot over for a closer look at the source of the music.
One such video has just under eight million views, with another on close to four million, while there are many more posts of people trying out the musical experiment for themselves when the posts started to become popular in June. But is it proof that cows genuinely love jazz?
Cows might like jazz - but they're also nosey
It’s always important to seek out other viewpoints and opinions. Other Side of the Story got in touch with Charles Goadby, a dairy farmer based in Nuneaton, Warwickshire who knows a LOT about cow behaviour.
“Cows are the most inquisitive animals you’ll find,” he said. “They would have heard the sound, they’ve seen the people, and they have come over to be nosey.”
According to Charles, any genre of music could, potentially, make a herd of cows want to come over for a closer look - but that isn’t to say gentle sounds can’t play a part in a cow’s life. He used to play a classical music radio station in his farm’s milking parlour 24 hours a day as it helped develop a sense of routine.
He explained: “The cows walk in, they hear the music, and it is almost like a trigger to stimulate the hormones and get the milk production flowing. They will milk faster, people believe, or release that milk a little bit quicker. It makes everything a bit nicer for the cows, and nicer for the people working in there.”
How other animals react to music
It isn’t just cows who can relate to music, either. Research has shown how seals and birds that mimic human speech, such as parrots and cockatoos, can move to the beat of disco classics. A 2024 online article on a website for pet owners featured vet and animal behaviour expert Dr Lisa Radosta, who mentioned research into music played at animal shelters, where dogs relaxed more to classical music - and also audiobooks.
While some online claims and trends can be malicious, it’s perhaps important to point out that this isn’t the intention with the ‘cows love jazz’ trend, and it can be fun to watch. As Charles pointed out: “These people aren’t spooking the cows, they’re coming over and being inquisitive and keeping themselves safe, just as long as the people who come along are staying on the right side of the fence. It’s a positive for farming that people see this type of thing - that cows are happy!”
He laughed: “There was one clip I saw, of a highland cow. It looked like it was dancing [to the jazz music being played]. But it wasn’t. It was actually scratching its backside on the fence.”
Why are animal videos so popular on social?
People seem to love animal videos and a 2020 study by the University of Leeds found a few reasons why. For a start, they can help us feel less stressful and also make us feel strong emotions like happiness. They are also very shareable and hashtags which become popular can reach a big audience in a short space of time. The hashtag #cow appears on almost two million TikTok posts – not bad for an animal which isn’t a traditional household pet!
The algorithm of a platform is a program which remembers what you have liked looking at in the past, and what you have shared and followed, and shows you similar content based on that. If you have shared posts of cows loving jazz, as well as more cute cow content, you may end up seeing performances by jazz musicians due to the algorithm. The for you page (FYP) on TikTok gives you a feed based on those algorithms.
That still leaves the question – do cows love jazz? They probably do enjoy it, in the same way that they enjoy sounds in general, but also just can't help being very, very curious creatures!
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