There is a quality of music that makes people tap their feet, rock their head, and get up and dance. For some music, such as jazz and various kinds of dance music, this is perhaps the most essential feature. Every musician with knowledge of these styles can have an opinion about the extent to which a given piece of music possesses this quality, and this is probably true for nonmusicians as well. In other words, it is well established in folk psychology.

However, agreed-upon terms or definitions are wanting. Here, I will refer to this experience as groove, operationally defined as “wanting to move some part of the body in relation to some aspect of the sound pattern.” This definition leaves open the quality of the music that is presumed to induce it:  At the present level of knowledge we can only be certain there exists such an experience (Madison, 2001, 2003), but there is no evidence that sound pattern properties actually induce it, that this induction is consistent among listeners, nor about which properties that might be. The present definition should be understood as describing the typical rather than being exclusive: It may be considered too open, for example that “some aspect” could be replaced by “the beat,” that “in relation” could be replaced by “repetitively” or “in synchrony.” However, such specifications raise further problems related to uncertainties about how to define beat, synchrony, and so forth. In any case, groove appears to be the most established term for this phenomenon (Iyer, 1998, 2002; Pressing, 2002; Schuller, 1989).

That all people may have the experience of groove in response to music does not necessarily mean that it is similarly induced. A piece of music that makes me experience groove might not do the same for someone else.