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Daniel Levitin: Your Brain on Music
The host, Michael Krasny, first briefly describes the power of music and
introduces psychologist Daniel Levitin, who possesses a musical background.
Following the introduction, the two discuss music and its effect on people.
Levitin describes that listening to music activates the neurons in the “pleasure
center” regions in the brain; however, the effects are dependent upon an
individual’s personal feelings of the music. Levitin believes that music has coevolved along with our brains throughout human evolution in the ages. The brains
of infants unconsciously absorb musical knowledge just as they absorb language,
and the environment an individual develops in influences his or her taste in music.
He describes that in various cultures throughout history, singing is often a
communal activity. Music helps people bond with others and is a language that
expresses emotions. Levitin believes that the quality of the music is in the ear of the
beholder, and hence, the music that an individual is drawn to is music that moves
him or her. Levitin discusses how processing music in the brain is a very complex
process which requires various sets of neurons in different regions of the brain. In
the first ten years of one’s life, neurons are working to make connections and nerve
cells are wired to be responsive to music. In terms of peoples’ personal preference
for music, he asserts that there is “safe” and “dangerous” music. People allow
others into their hearts when they listen to music, and so some may be unwilling to
listen to certain types of music. Levitin states that music with lyrics is capable of
uniting the whole brain; in mostly the frontal lobes of the brain, language taps into
the left hemisphere, while instrumental music taps into the right hemisphere. He
also discusses how music can often surface deeply buried memories. Almost all that
a person experiences is stored in the brain, and then memories are retrieved. Music
is often tied to the experience of the time and place in which one listens to it, and
so it can draw back memories. Finally Levitin discusses that musicians are often
unable to concentrate with music on since it draws their attention, but many people
are able to create great works while listening to inspirational music.
Levitin then receives calls from listeners and discusses and answers
questions. He mentions how music often serves as a mood regulator for people, so
for music therapy, it is important to find the particular music that will move a
certain person. Interestingly, sad music can often be uplifting because it is
comforting to know that another feels similar emotions and also because the
composer was able to use a negative emotion to create something beautiful.
Furthermore, Levitin discusses that music can manipulate us, though it is not truly
subliminal because an individual will be conscious of it. One caller describes that as
a musician, hearing music often interfered with the music already in his head. To
continue, Levitin describes how music has aided in social synchronization and
cohesion throughout history, especially through singing with others. Creating music
with others is a special, intimate experience that creates a bond. Thus, in ancient
times, groups would band together and sing to ward off predators. Then Levitin goes

on to describe the Mozart Effect, which is an idea that 20 minutes of listening to
Mozart’s music a day can make children more intelligent. Although this is not
necessarily true exclusively for Mozart’s compositions and although experiments
used to prove the Mozart effect were flawed, there is evidence to show that music
can increase intelligence. To follow, Levitin discusses that about ten percent of
people do not appreciate music. The other ninety percent of people gain the basic
knowledge of music, in the form of scales and such, and are able to more easily
appreciate music. Musical knowledge is like a second or third language, so it is often
most easily acquired by the age of ten. Following that discussion, a caller describes
that undergoing musical therapy improved his daughter’s disorder. Then, Levitin
describes that different music is often used in public places to serve different
functions. He goes on to talk of how music can make large public spaces more
civilized and intimate. Levitin describes that composers choose tempos very
particularly to invoke certain feelings, and producers do often ask for changes to
make music more marketable. To follow, Levitin discusses that the music that an
individual likes must strike a balance between familiarity and unfamiliarity; and
simplicity and complexity. Additionally, Levitin talks of how he studies why people
choose to become musical experts and whether what musical experts perceive is
different from what average people perceive. Moreover, Levitin asserts that the
charm of certain intervals of pitch for an individual is learned, based on the
environment and music that one is accustomed to. Next Levitin asserts that math is
a language, a system by which we communicate about the psychical world, just as
music is a language, a system by which we communicate about our emotions.
Children who learn two to three language at a young age tend to be skilled in
various other activities. Thus there is a positive correlation between mathematical
and musical skills. Levitin describes that people do have the ability to sing and
convey emotions, though not all have the ability to sing with a beautiful voice. He
then asserts that the brain has computational modules that group entities together,
which allow the brain to process notes together as a song. Levitin concludes by
discussing how music can invoke feelings and emotions.
Overall, I enjoyed Levitin’s discussion of the mind and of the power of music.
Musicophilia Chapter 9—Papa Blows His Nose in G: Absolute Pitch
In the ninth chapter of Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain, Oliver Sacks
discusses absolute pitch, the ability to determine the pitch of any note without
comparing it to any external source. Although the precision of absolute pitch
various, those with absolute pitch can identify about seventy tones, and each has a
unique quality to them. To those who are born with absolute pitch, the ability seems
perfectly normal. Sacks cites that The Oxford Companion to Music contains many
examples of absolute pitch, and that the entomologist Olavi Sotavalta is capable of
estimating exact frequencies by ear—an ability that requires a skilled ear,
knowledge of scales, as well as knowledge of frequencies to correlate pitch with.

Possessors of perfect pitch perceive each tone and key as each with its own
different character and feeling.
The possession of absolute pitch does have disadvantages. Those with
absolute pitch often feel distressed when they hear music that is played in an
incorrect key. Thus the inconstant tunings of musical instruments and the
transposition of musical compositions can be disturbing to people with perfect pitch.
Another difficulty is that those with perfect pitch may have difficulty hearing
intervals and harmonies because they are conscious of the individual chroma of the
notes that compose them.
Although absolute pitch is not necessarily of importance, to those we possess
it and lose it later in life, its loss is felt extremely keenly. While with absolute pitch,
every note and key has its own unique feeling, once absolute pitch is lost, no real
difference can be perceived any longer.
Absolute pitch is rare and occurs in less than one person in ten thousand.
Most people, however, can recognize and discriminate between pitches, but cannot
associate them with verbal labels. Diana Deutsch describes her own personal
experience in having absolute pitch as well as how she gets a feeling of familiarity
for notes and pitches. According to anecdotal experiences and several large-scale
studies, absolute pitch is more common in musicians than in the general public.
Among musicians, it is more common in those with musical training beginning at a
young age. Furthermore, it is more common in certain families, though it is not
certain whether this is due to genetics or the musical environment. A correlation
occurs between absolute pitch and linguistic background, as shown through several
studies. Through this research, it was theorized that “if given the opportunity,
infants can acquire [absolute pitch] as a feature of speech, which can then carry
over to music.” The critical period for the development of absolute pitch occurred
before the age of eight or so, which was about the same age at which children find
it more difficult to learn another language. The studies suggest that all infants have
the potential to acquire absolute pitch as if it were a language, though genetic
differences may also be important. The neural aspects of musicians with and
without absolute pitch have been shown to be different as well. Those with absolute
pitch have asymmetry between the volumes of the right and left planum temporal
as well as asymmetries in the size and activity of the planum temporal.
Those with absolute pitch must be able to perceive precise pitch differences
as well as to label them according to the notes of a musical scale. Inherently, those
with absolute pitch may perceptually categorize pitch before they learn categorical
labels of pitch. A study comparing infants to adults with and without musical
training in a test of tone sequences suggested that absolute pitch may be universal
in infancy but then may later be lost in age. The researchers argued that the
development of language inhibits absolute pitch and that only unusual conditions,

such as the acquisition of a tonal language, allow absolute pitch to be retained. One
researcher suggests that music and language have a common origin.
Overall, I greatly enjoyed reading this chapter and learning about perfect
pitch.
Musicophilia Chapter 14—The Key of Clear Green: Synesthesia and Music
In the fourteenth chapter of Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain, Oliver
Sacks discusses synesthesia and its relation to music.
Francis Galton was among the first to systematically account synesthesia in
his book Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development. The occurrence of
synesthesia is estimated to be about one person in two thousand; however it may
be much more common, as most people who have it perceive it as normal.
Sacks describes one patient who became completely colorblind following a
head injury, losing his ability to perceive and imagine color, as well as his seeing of
color with music. Sacks was persuaded by the incident that synesthesia was a
physiological condition that depended upon specific areas and connections in the
cortex. Musical synesthesia is the most common form of synesthesia, though it is
not known whether it is more common in musicians than in non-musicians.
Musicians are, however, more likely to be aware of it.
Michael Torke, a composer, was influenced by his synesthesia. He possesses
absolute pitch as well as associates fixed, specific colors with the playing of music,
scales, arpeggios, and any music with a certain key. For him, key synesthesia and
absolute pitch are interconnected, as each key and mode looks as different as it
sounds. He describes seeing the colors in terms of their luminosity and asserts that
the synesthetic colors are inward and never confused with external colors. His
synesthetic colors have been fixed and consistent for over forty years. Torke sees
colors only when he hears a succession of notes that is sufficient to indicate the
basic key signature. Furthermore, he has color associations only with key—not with
musical pattern, texture, rhythm, instruments, composers, mood, or emotion. He
also possesses nonmusical synesthesia. Torke feels that synesthesia has not made
much difference to his life, since to him, it is completely normal.
Composer David Caldwell, possessed a different synesthesia than did Torke.
Although Caldwell does not have perfect pitch, he possesses a strong relative pitch,
with which he can infer the key that a piece is in. Caldwell believes that the color of
music is integral to his musical sensibility and thought. For him, keys, musical
themes, patterns, ideas, moods, instruments, and instrumental parts all have
unique colors. Synesthetes each possess their own color associations. In contrast to
Torke, whose color connections seem more fixed, Caldwell has color connections
that relate to how he feels about the keys and how he uses them in composing and
playing music.

Sacks also describes a case of a musician with both music-color and musictaste synesthesia, and then moves on to describe Christine Leahy, who has letter
chromesthesia and a less specific color synesthesia for music. She does not possess
absolute pitch; however, she experiences synesthesia according to the letters of the
musical scale. For her, the sharps or flats are blank, though the diatonic scale of C
major creates a “rainbow” of colors. Leahy feels that her musical synesthesia
enhances her music, even though it may have begun linguistically rather than
musically.
Patrick Ehlen experiences extensive synesthesia to color, to music, and to all
sounds. He does not feel a fixed relation between color and key, but his synesthesia
is evoked by other aspects of music, such as rhythm, tempo, shapes of melodies,
modulations, richness of harmonies, timbres of instruments, and the overall
character and mood of music. Ehlen views his synesthesia as valuable to his
composing. For him, color is integral to music.
Lastly, Sacks describes Sue B., a synesthete who experiences musical
synesthesia with light, shape, and position, rather than color.
Scientific interest in synesthesia has greatly fluctuated throughout history.
Several researchers believe that synesthesia is strongly genetic. Although the
condition has been regarded as rare, a recent study found that one person in 23 had
a form of synesthesia, and that there was no significant different among different
genders. In recent years, psychologists have developed objective tests to
distinguish true synesthesia from pseudosynesthesia. Now, functional brain imaging
has confirmed the physiological as well as the psychological reality of synesthesia.
Techniques of functional brain imaging of those with synesthesia provide evidence
for the coactivation of typically functionally independent areas of the sensory
cortex. Researchers suggest that infants are all colored-hearing synesthetes, but
that with age, the connection between the two areas of the brain are lost, as
synesthetic “confusion” gives way to clearer segregation of the senses. In
synesthetes, it is supposed that genetic abnormality prevents the complete deletion
of the early hyperconnectivity. The condition seems more common in children and
tends to disappear at adolescence, though rare situations may provoke its
appearance later in life. The most significant cause of permanent acquired
synesthesia is blindness, for which Sacks cites the cases of Jacques Lusseyran and
V.S. Ramachandran. For those who acquire synesthesia, though it is beautiful, it
prevents the enjoyment of music, while for those born with color-music synesthesia,
it is different. Though the experience of synesthesia differs, for all those with it,
synesthesia seems natural.
Overall, I felt Sacks’ discussion of synesthesia was very interesting and I
enjoyed learning more about musical synesthesia.
Musicophilia Chapter 2—A Strangely Familiar Feeling: Musical Seizures

In the second chapter of Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain, Oliver
Sacks discusses musical seizures.
Sacks begins by introducing Jon S., a man who experiences musical seizures.
One day, he had been entering a closet, when he suddenly heard a violin playing a
classical, soothing melody. An office colleague saw him slump over. When Mr.S next
become conscious, he was questioned by an emergency medical technician and he
could remember his name, though not the date. After being taken to an emergency
room at a hospital, he heard music again and lost consciousness, as he experienced
a full seizure with convulsions. After undergoing tests, he was put on an
antiepileptic drug to protect from future seizures. His temporal lobe epilepsy may
have been caused by a severe head injury he had received when he was fifteen,
resulting in scarring in his temporal lobes. Mr. S was not very musical and was
unable to describe or sing the melody that he had heard. Although he typically
listens to popular music, the classical violin melody sounded familiar and nostalgic
to him. He wonders whether the music was an actual memory of a melody he had
heard in the past or whether he only feels an illusion of familiarity as if it were a
melody heard in a dream.
To continue, Sacks describes that Hughlings Jackson wrote in the 1870s of the
feeling of familiarity that often precedes a temporal lobe seizure. He noted that
some lose consciousness during a seizure, while others do not. The “doubling of
consciousness” is when during a seizure, one remains aware of his or her
surroundings as well as enters a superimposed state, in which strange feelings are
experienced, such as the hearing of music.
Finally, Sacks introduces Eric Markowitz, who developed an astrocytoma, a
type of tumor, in his left temporal lobe. Although it was operated on, it recurred ten
years following his operation and was no longer operable because it was too close
to the speech-controlling areas of his temporal lobe. As the tumor grew again, he
experienced seizures in which familiar music “explodes” for a few minutes in his
head. Although Markowitz is a musician and has had several seizures, he is also
unable to recognize his hallucinatory music. To him, the seizures feel to be a
“strange yet familiar confusion”, during which he finds it difficult to think clearly. He
asserts that his normal musical imagery differs from the music of his seizures
because as he composes, the melodies that appear in his mind are intentional.
Markowitz feels that his epileptic music seems almost like a dangerous “spell” that
draws him in, yet also feels that it has inspired him to compose music echoing its
strangely familiar melodies.
Overall, Sacks’ description of musical seizures was very intriguing to me,
especially since I had not learned much about them prior to reading his writing.
Musicophilia Chapter 4—Music on the Brain: Imagery and Imagination

In the fourth chapter of Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain, Oliver
Sacks discusses musical imagery and creativity.
Music, both external and internal, forms an important part of most of our
lives. Musical imagery varies significantly among individuals, and Sacks cites his
mother and father as examples of this. Professional musicians generally possess
great powers of musical imagery. Many composers, such as Beethoven, compose
initially or entirely in their minds, rather than at an instrument. Beethoven
composed even after he become completely dead, and his musical imagery may in
fact have been heightened by his deafness. With the lack of normal sensations of
sound, his auditory cortex may have become more sensitive. Sacks cites that his
own musical imagery and perception is more limited to that of a pianist. By merely
thinking of one of Chopin’s mazurkas, he will hear the piece in his mind, see his
hands upon a keyboard, and feel them playing the piece. Going through passages in
the mind is a vital method of practicing for performers. A concert violinist, Cindy
Foster, affirms Sacks assertion.
Studies that have been carried out by Robert Zatorre and his colleagues have
shown the imagining music activates the auditory cortex almost as strongly as
listening to music, as well as the motor and auditory cortex, if one imagines the
action of playing. Studies of regional cerebral blood flow suggest that mental
practice allows for the modulation of neural circuits involved in early motor skill
learning, resulting in improvement. A “combination of mental and physical practice”
can allow for better performance than only physical practice.
Musical imagery can be enhanced by expectation and suggestion. Sacks
describes that Jerome Bruner once began to listen to one of Mozart’s pieces only to
find that he had not played it on his turntable at all and he had been imagining it. In
the 1960’s, inconclusive experiments were conducted to study the “White
Christmas effect”. When the well-known song was played, some subjects “heard” it
even when the volume was muted. Functional MRI scans have recently confirmed
physiologically the “filling in” of music by involuntary musical imagery.
Deliberate mental imagery involves the auditory and motor cortex, as well as
regions of the frontal cortex, and is vital to professional musicians. Although not all
can call upon voluntary musical imagery, almost all can call upon involuntary
musical imagery. Repeated, intense exposure to a certain piece or type of music can
result in one type of involuntary musical imagery. Sacks cites his own such
experiences with repeatedly listening to music. He describes that the musical
networks of his brain become supersaturated and readily replay the music. This kind
of musical imagery is the least personal. When music that a person has not thought
of in many years suddenly replays in his or her mind, the reason is much more
mysterious and deep. To conclude, Sacks cites a few personal experiences of
musical imagery. He discusses how he has connected music with events in his life.

Overall, I greatly enjoyed Sacks’ discussion of musical imagery, especially
since music composes a great part of my life and is very precious to me.

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