Are songs getting faster these days?

(File photo) Online music streaming via services like Spotify is making it quicker for one to play music. Photo: Reuters

Online streaming is making it quicker not only to play music. A new study finds that pop songs themselves are getting faster as listeners' attention spans diminish.

Instrumental openings to songs have shrunk dramatically over the past three decades and, to a lesser extent, the average tempo of hit singles has been speeding up, the research found.