Many people think that music is particularly powerful or unique as a cue for bringing back memories from our lives. Empirical research has partially supported this idea, by showing that music can evoke more vivid and emotional autobiographical memories than various other everyday cues. But it is still not well understood as to why music might be a particularly salient cue for such memories. In this talk I will present a series of recent studies from my lab in which we’ve manipulated features of musical retrieval cues and associated events, allowing us to identify key factors underpinning this complex relationship between music and autobiographical memory.