tag:theconversation.com,2011:/global/topics/science-of-music-3359/articlesScience of music – The Conversation2018-08-13T11:20:23Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/989602018-08-13T11:20:23Z2018-08-13T11:20:23ZIs there such a thing as an objectively ‘bad’ song?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/230900/original/file-20180807-191031-1dsvdvi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=1%2C0%2C937%2C574&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Estrada Anton via Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Everyone has a song which irritates the hell out of them – but <a href="http://ismir2005.ismir.net/proceedings/2124.pdf">Achy Breaky Heart by Billy Ray Cyrus</a> was found by one 2005 study to have been nominated most often as “the worst song ever”. The authors, academics from New Zealand and the US, listed a few reasons: awful lyrics, an overly simple melody, negative personal associations, but they also found that their respondents “wrestled – unsuccessfully – with the problem of providing a reasoned, rational analysis of a visceral response”.</p>
<p>In other words, they found it hard to put in to words just why, or how much, they hated the song.</p>
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<span class="caption">Just don’t tell his heart, his achy breaky heart.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/los-angeles-jan-17-billy-ray-71311477?src=lpel79f82LcFJ3HudrRFzQ-1-2">shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>From songs and films to universities, baking and mortgages, it seems as though everything is now ranked and rated. Consumers want to know what to choose, and organisations want to know what to back. Getting the rating right is important, so can we objectively distinguish the good from the bad?</p>
<p>In some cases there is a clear, objective criterion. When two football teams play each other, the better one scores more goals. When choosing between two mortgages, the better one costs less money. Sometimes we want to know which will be better in the future. Which football team is going to win next weekend, and which mortgage will cost less in ten years? We can guess, or we can make an objective prediction based on past data. So, for example, we can usually say with some confidence that Manchester City will probably beat Southampton.</p>
<h2>The science of songs</h2>
<p>So, how about songs? There have been claims that machine learning can use data from past chart performances to predict, from its acoustic characteristics, a song’s likelihood of success. Tests have yielded mixed results. Research which has been <a href="http://doi.org/10.1080/09298215.2014.881888">successful in predicting success</a> has mostly been in limited domains. <a href="http://ismir2008.ismir.net/papers/ISMIR2008_133.pdf">A larger study</a> found machine learning methods could not distinguish what acoustic characteristics led to success.</p>
<p>This is hardly surprising. Although many hit songs have characteristics in common, there are always oddities that succeed when in theory they should not – remember <a href="https://www.thesun.co.uk/living/2974489/crazy-frog-just-turned-20-relive-his-hellish-magic-here/">Crazy Frog</a>? In the wider world of music, acoustic characteristics seem to have little impact on whether a piece classes as music at all, let alone whether or not it is successful. There is the John Cage piece, Organ²/ASLSP (As Slow as Possible), which is scheduled to <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/arts-post/post/worlds-longest-concert-will-last-639-years/2011/11/21/gIQAWrdXiN_blog.html">last 639 years</a>, Gÿorgy Ligeti’s Poème Symphonique which solely constitutes <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIkLsDdeHio">sounds from ticking metronomes</a>, and an entire composition – once again from John Cage – in which <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4%E2%80%B233%E2%80%B3">no sounds are played at all</a>. All three of them regularly bring in audiences (including me).</p>
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<p>It is clearly difficult to predict musical popularity, but judging the characteristics of a song – such as mood or “danceability” – has been <a href="http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.73.8209,%20http://ismir2009.ismir.net/proceedings/PS4-8.pdf">much more successful</a>. As with most things we choose different types of music for particular purposes. The tunes that ease the morning commute may not help you get your groove on in the evening. </p>
<p>Specific characteristics of a song contribute to its effectiveness for certain uses: a clear beat around 120 beats per minute if you want to dance – or something with no sudden changes in tempo if relaxation is what you want. The most successful song ever, by number of times it has been performed, is almost certainly <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-case-against-happy-birthday-copyright-protection-45415">Happy Birthday</a> by Patty and Mildred J Hill. It is superbly suited to its sole purpose: a public and often spontaneous celebration. It is short, easy to remember and easy to sing. I doubt, however, that anyone would claim Happy Birthday was the best song ever.</p>
<h2>No accounting for taste</h2>
<p>Although objective characteristics can teach us something about how suitable a song is for a given situation, the notion of a song being “good” or “bad” in an absolute sense is much more problematic. But anyone who has ever switched off Radio 1 in disgust – or wrenched the sound system away from a friend playing just the wrong part of Madonna’s early work – has had the experience of recognising whether a song is good or bad.</p>
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<span class="caption">Sometimes we’re just not in the mood.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/abstract-woman-hands-playing-music-notes-507995524?src=zTTnFiNxeFhGAVSVh4fR5Q-1-0">shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>How is it that we can be so confident in our own judgement and yet incapable of designing an objective means of explaining why? “Ultimately”, <a href="http://ismir2005.ismir.net/proceedings/2124.pdf">concluded the 2005 study</a>, “the songs that we dislike depend as much upon ourselves as upon characteristics of the songs.” The characteristics of the songs are fixed. The characteristics of the listeners can change.</p>
<p>So here is my hypothesis. Really great songs are those which transcend the purpose for which they seem intended and make a change in us. On hearing a song like Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” (performed well) we become a different person, a person who loves that song. Bad songs are not those which just leave us cold and unchanged, they make us actively hate them. </p>
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<p>And bad songs are no use for anything except annoying our friends. Remember Crazy Frog again?</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98960/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alan Marsden receives funding from the AHRC (UK) and JSPS (Japan) and is editor of Journal of New Music Research.</span></em></p>Most people have strong opinions on what makes a song good or bad. But is anyone actually right?Alan Marsden, Senior Lecturer in Music, Lancaster UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/653652016-09-15T20:01:01Z2016-09-15T20:01:01ZWhy sad songs say so much (to some people, but not others)<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/137816/original/image-20160914-4963-19knfh1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Melancholic or moved?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">avemario/Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Tear-jerkers such as Adele’s <a href="https://youtu.be/hLQl3WQQoQ0">Someone Like You</a> frequently top the charts these days, while gloomy classical compositions like <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zi8vJ_lMxQI">Mozart’s Requiem</a> have moved people for centuries. Both portray and bring about a strong sense of loss and sadness. But our enjoyment of sad music is paradoxical – we go out of our way to avoid sadness in our daily lives. So why is it that, in the arts, themes such as loss can be safely experienced, profoundly enjoyed and even celebrated?</p>
<p>Researchers have long been puzzled about this phenomenon and it’s not until fairly recently that we have started to gain some insight into how we enjoy music. Now, a new study by colleagues and me, <a href="http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2016.01176/">published in Frontiers in Psychology</a>, has discovered why some of us enjoy sad music more than others – and it’s got a lot to do with empathy.</p>
<p>Research <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-your-musical-taste-says-about-your-personality-50492">has already shown</a> that open individuals typically score highly on musical sophistication, while “systemisers”, those with a strong interest in patterns, systems and rules, tend to prefer intense music such as rock and punk.</p>
<p>But what about sad music? Surely nobody would like it unless the emotion experienced is not actual sadness but some kind of transformed version of it? Based on <a href="http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0157444">large surveys</a> of what people experience while listening to sad music, we know that these experiences typically fall into different categories.</p>
<p>For some, sad music actually deepens and amplifies the feelings of <em>sorrow</em> and <em>loss</em> – emotions that are connected to personal events and memories. These experiences are far from pleasurable and therefore do not offer an explanation for the paradox. For others, sad music brings about feelings of <em>melancholia</em>, the kind of sentiment you might have on a rainy day after your favourite team lost.</p>
<h2>The mystery of being moved</h2>
<p>The most curious type of experience, however, is the <em>feeling of being moved</em>, which we think is the basis of our fascination with sad music. This experience can be difficult to describe verbally, but it is often intense and pleasurable. However, not everyone <a href="https://theconversation.com/chills-and-thrills-why-some-people-love-music-and-others-dont-24007">seems to be able to experience it</a>. So who would? Intuitively, it would make sense that those who easily feel empathy are also easily moved.</p>
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<p>To test this hypothesis, we recruited a nationally representative sample of 102 participants to a listening experiment. We played them a piece of instrumental sad music, Discovery of the Camp by Michael Kamen, which was briefly played in the drama miniseries <a href="http://gb.imdb.com/title/tt0185906/">Band of Brothers</a>. In an initial pilot study, the vast majority of people couldn’t recognise it. </p>
<p>Our decision to focus on instrumental music that participants would be unlikely to have heard previously was to rule out any external sources of emotions, such as specific memories they might have for a particular piece of music or interpretations of the lyrics. In other words, we wanted to be sure that the participants’ emotional responses would be brought about by the music itself. </p>
<p>The listeners were also asked to reveal a wide range of background measures including how prone they were to dwell in nostalgia and what their current mood, health, and quality of life was. We also profiled their music preferences and used standard trait empathy measure, “<a href="http://www.sjdm.org/dmidi/Interpersonal_Reactivity_Index.html">the interpersonal reactivity index</a>”, to evaluate how much empathy they had.</p>
<p>The experiences generated by this particular music ranged from feeling relaxed or moved to sometimes being anxious or nervous. Participants who experienced being moved reported intense, pleasurable, and yet sad emotions at the same time. Crucially, we found that the people who were moved by the piece also scored highly on empathy. Conversely, those with a tendency of being low on empathy hardly ever reported being moved by this music. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/137914/original/image-20160915-30580-1ron6w8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/137914/original/image-20160915-30580-1ron6w8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/137914/original/image-20160915-30580-1ron6w8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/137914/original/image-20160915-30580-1ron6w8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/137914/original/image-20160915-30580-1ron6w8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/137914/original/image-20160915-30580-1ron6w8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/137914/original/image-20160915-30580-1ron6w8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Pleasure from sad music may be a reward for empathetic concern.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Dragon Images/Shutterstock</span></span>
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<p>What’s more, our findings suggest that the key to the enjoyment is not only the ability to empathise with the sad emotions expressed by the music, but also the ability to self-regulate and distance oneself from this process. This specific component of empathy is known as “empathic concern”. While empathising means responding to somebody’s perceived emotion by experiencing a similar feeling, empathetic concern means also feeling tenderness, compassion and sympathy for them. This specific trait best predicted whether our participants reported being moved by the sad music.</p>
<h2>Understanding the results</h2>
<p>The research adds to a body of work suggesting that music appreciation involves social cognition. People sensitive and willing to empathise with the misfortune of another person – in this case represented by the sad music – are somehow rewarded by the process. There are a number of theories about why that is.</p>
<p>The reward could be purely biochemical. We have all experienced the feeling of relief and serenity after a good cry. This is due to a cocktail of chemicals triggered by crying. A <a href="http://msx.sagepub.com/content/15/2/146">recent theory</a> proposes that even a fictional sadness is enough to fool our body to trigger such an endocrine response, intended to soften the mental pain involved in real loss. This response is driven by hormones such as oxytocin and prolactin, which actually induce the feelings of comfort, warmth and mild pleasure in us. This mix of hormones is probably particularly potent when you take the actual loss and sadness out of the equation – which you can often do in music-induced sadness.</p>
<p>It is also possible that the effect is mainly psychological, where those who allow themselves to be emotionally immersed in the sad music are simply exercising their full emotional repertoire in a way that is inherently rewarding. The capacity to understand the emotions of others is crucial for navigating the social world we live in, and therefore exercising such an ability is likely to be rewarding – due to its evolutionary significance. </p>
<p>Music could almost be compared to a <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-do-only-some-people-get-skin-orgasms-from-listening-to-music-59719">powerful drug</a>. If empathy lies at the core of transforming this “drug” into pleasure or pain, could music itself be used to train people to be more empathetic?</p>
<p>We do not yet know, although <a href="https://theconversation.com/explainer-what-is-music-therapy-20154">music therapy</a> is commonly used to rehabilitate people with emotional disorders, such as <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-well-do-you-know-your-own-feelings-31309">depression and low self-esteem</a>. Understanding the emotional transformations induced by sad music could certainly help us to understand how musical interventions could be used for those suffering from emotional disorders. </p>
<p>While we may not have fully cracked the code of these transformations, the new study is a first step. But it certainly seems that allowing yourself to be transported and immersed in a musical journey into tragedy and sorrow may be just what your social mind craves and needs to keep in shape.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/65365/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tuomas Eerola receives funding from Academy of Finland (grant # 270220 for Sweet Sorrow - understanding the mechanisms involved in deriving pleasure from sad music). </span></em></p>People who are compassionate may be ‘rewarded’ by experiencing pleasure from sad music.Tuomas Eerola, Professor of Music Cognition, Durham UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/395502015-04-08T10:05:07Z2015-04-08T10:05:07ZHow the brain reads music: the evidence for musical dyslexia<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77219/original/image-20150407-26502-1jind05.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Could dysmusia be to reading music what dyslexia is to reading text, and dyscalculia is to math?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-108652397/stock-photo-music-sheet-with-pencil.html?src=vw4RKS7nP1WdcUtILeRZDQ-1-76">Sheet music via www.shutterstock.com.</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Music education in the western world often emphasizes musical literacy, the ability to read musical notation fluently. But this is not always an easy task – even for professional musicians. Which raises the question: Is there such a thing as musical dyslexia? </p>
<p>Dyslexia is a learning disability that occurs when the brain is unable to process written words, even when the person has had proper training in reading. Researchers debate the underlying causes and treatments, but the predominant theory is that people with dyslexia have a problem with <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=4xOOcpshF5sC&pg=PA1&dq=Dyslexia,+Learning,+and+the+Brain+Introduction&hl=en&sa=X&ei=_RUkVfm6LITYsAWzy4HQDQ&ved=0CCwQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Dyslexia%2C%20Learning%2C%20and%20the%20Brain%20Introduction&f=false">phonological processing</a> – the ability to see a symbol (a letter or a phoneme) and relate it to speech sounds. Dyslexia is difficult to diagnose, but it is thought to occur in <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2528651/">up to 10% of the population</a>.</p>
<p>In 2000, Neil Gordon, a retired pediatric neurologist, proposed the idea of musical dyslexia (<a href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCkQFjAB&url=http%3A%2F%2Fonlinelibrary.wiley.com%2Fdoi%2F10.1111%2Fj.1469-8749.2000.tb00073.x%2Fpdf&ei=PhkkVePYBMmpsAXT04GQBQ&usg=AFQjCNHrdd0It69Yg_fHZuCr6775vN2_eQ&sig2=_4dskIWJLvSN92194cumRw&bvm=bv.89947451,d.b2w">dysmusia</a>), based on growing evidence that the areas of the brain involved in reading music and text differed.</p>
<p>The idea that dyslexia could affect the reading of non-language symbols is not new. For instance, dyscalculia is the difficulty reading and understanding mathematical symbols. <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1041608014002179">Recent research</a> supports dyslexia and dyscalculia as separate conditions with unique causes (dyscalculia is thought to be caused by a deficit in spatial processing in the parietal lobe). If the brain processes words and mathematical symbols differently, why not musical symbols too?</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77221/original/image-20150407-26488-1qgxhe5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77221/original/image-20150407-26488-1qgxhe5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77221/original/image-20150407-26488-1qgxhe5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77221/original/image-20150407-26488-1qgxhe5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77221/original/image-20150407-26488-1qgxhe5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77221/original/image-20150407-26488-1qgxhe5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77221/original/image-20150407-26488-1qgxhe5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Reading music is a whole brain activity.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-215469265/stock-photo-professional-female-flutist-performing-on-stage-with-sheet-music.html?src=vw4RKS7nP1WdcUtILeRZDQ-2-96">Flutist via www.shutterstock.com.</a></span>
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<h2>Music’s written system</h2>
<p>Western music, like language, has a highly evolved coding system. This allows it to be written down and transmitted from composer to performer. But music, unlike language, uses a spatial arrangement for pitch. The page is divided into staffs of five lines each. Basically, the higher a symbol is placed on the staff, the higher the pitch. </p>
<p>Unlike letters in text, pitches can be stacked, indicating simultaneous performance (chords). Music also uses a system of symbols to indicate how pitches should be played. Symbols can indicate duration (rhythm), volume (dynamics) and other performance cues. Music also utilizes written words to indicate both the expressive features of the music and the lyrics in vocal music. Lyrics may be in languages not spoken by the performer. </p>
<p>Due to differences in the physical features of the written systems, it makes sense that the brain would read music and text differently. This appears to be the case – at least to some extent. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77211/original/image-20150407-26502-l0cuuj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77211/original/image-20150407-26502-l0cuuj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77211/original/image-20150407-26502-l0cuuj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77211/original/image-20150407-26502-l0cuuj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77211/original/image-20150407-26502-l0cuuj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77211/original/image-20150407-26502-l0cuuj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77211/original/image-20150407-26502-l0cuuj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Reading music and reading text use different systems in the brain.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-246050170/stock-photo-violin-and-books-on-a-red-background.html?src=5AecHeasdJvkvnYFlVK-xQ-1-0">Violin and books via www.shutterstock.com.</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Text and music reading in the brain</h2>
<p>In the brain, reading music is a widespread, multi-modal activity, meaning that many different areas of the brain are involved at the same time. It includes motor, visual, auditory, audiovisual, somatosensory, parietal and frontal areas in both hemispheres and the cerebellum – making music reading truly a whole brain activity. With training, the neural network strengthens. Even reading a <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19320551">single pitch activates this widespread network in musicians</a>. While text and music reading share some networks, they are largely independent. The pattern of activation for reading musical symbols and letters is different across the brain. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77223/original/image-20150407-26515-xgag6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77223/original/image-20150407-26515-xgag6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77223/original/image-20150407-26515-xgag6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=797&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77223/original/image-20150407-26515-xgag6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=797&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77223/original/image-20150407-26515-xgag6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=797&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77223/original/image-20150407-26515-xgag6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1001&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77223/original/image-20150407-26515-xgag6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1001&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77223/original/image-20150407-26515-xgag6v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1001&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Composer Maurice Ravel.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AMaurice_Ravel_1925.jpg">Bibliothèque nationale de France via Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Brain damage, especially if it is widespread, as was the case with the composer Maurice Ravel, (perhaps best known for <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r30D3SW4OVw">Boléro</a>), will likely impair both text and music reading abilities. Ravel had a form of <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=yaDzEjEaio8C&pg=PA348&lpg=PA348&dq=ravel+frontal+lobe&source=bl&ots=EOwX4HUJMa&sig=9G5GClVdKs-_xSYx1lWU14Gpkjw&hl=en&sa=X&ei=qBokVe3AOoGZsAXnoYDgBw&ved=0CEMQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=ravel%20frontal%20lobe&f=false">frontotemporal lobe dementia</a>.</p>
<p>However, there have been cases where a more limited brain injury impaired reading of one coding system and spared the other. </p>
<p><a href="http://brain.oxfordjournals.org/content/129/10/2554">Ian McDonald</a>, a neurologist and amateur pianist, documented the loss and recovery of his own ability to read music after a stroke, though his ability to read text was unaffected. <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/14/books/review/excerpt-the-minds-eye.html">Oliver Sacks</a> described the case of a professional pianist who, through a degenerative brain disease (<a href="http://www.alz.org/dementia/posterior-cortical-atrophy.asp">Posterior Cortical Atrophy</a>), first lost her ability to read music while retaining her text reading for many years. <a href="http://brain.oxfordjournals.org/content/106/2/435">In another case, showing the opposite pattern</a>, a musician lost his ability to read text, but retained his ability to read music. </p>
<p>Cases where music and language seem to be differently affected by brain damage have fascinated researchers for centuries. The earliest reported case of someone who was unable to speak, but retained his ability to sing, was in the 1745 article, <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=vaAVKnt5-AYC&pg=PA18&dq=One+a+mute+who+can+sing&hl=en&sa=X&ei=V_QjVbzhAoKpsAX1zYDoDQ&ved=0CCQQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=One%20a%20mute%20who%20can%20sing&f=false">On a Mute who Can Sing</a>.</p>
<p>More recently, the Russian composer, <a href="http://www.psy.org.ru/af%26comst.htm">Vissarion Shebalin</a>, lost his language abilities after a severe stroke, but retained his ability to compose. Maintaining the ability to sing in the absence of language has led to the creation of a therapeutic treatment called <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1749-6632.2009.04859.x">Melodic Intonation Therapy</a> that essentially replaces speech with song. This allows the patient to communicate verbally. These cases and many others demonstrate that music and language are to some extent separate neurological processes. </p>
<p>Differences in reading ability can occur even within musical notation. <a href="http://www.ac-psych.org/en/download-pdf/volume/2/issue/2/id/18">Cases</a> have been reported where musicians have lost their ability to read pitch, but retained their ability to read rhythm, and vice versa. <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16246591">fMRI studies</a> have confirmed that the brain processes pitch (spatial information) and rhythm (symbol recognition) differently. </p>
<h2>Musical dyslexia</h2>
<p>The research starts to imply how a specifically musical dyslexia could occur. This deficit may be centered on pitch or musical symbols or both. No conclusive case of musical dyslexia has yet been reported (though <a href="http://bit.ly/1FhNEEN">Hébert and colleagues</a> have come close) and efforts to determine the effects of dyslexia on reading musical notation have been inconclusive. </p>
<p>Children in western cultures are taught to read text, but not always taught to read music. Even when they are, inabilities to read music are not generally treated as a serious concern. Many gifted musicians are able to function at a professional level purely learning music by ear. Among musicians, there is a wide range of music reading proficiencies. This is especially apparent with sight reading (the first performance of a notated piece). Identifying musical dyslexia could help explain why some musicians read well and others don’t.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/39550/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jennifer Mishra does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>If the brain processes words and mathematical symbols differently, why not musical symbols too?Jennifer Mishra, Associate Professor, Music Education, University of Missouri-St. LouisLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/353672014-12-23T20:07:07Z2014-12-23T20:07:07ZAll together now – three evolutionary perks of singing<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/66963/original/image-20141211-6030-14ko55u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Cranking out a tune cements our social networks.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/yoursecretadmiral/3117590062">Julie/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>We’re enjoying the one time of year when protests of “I can’t sing!” are laid aside and we sing carols with others. For some this is a once-a-year special event; the rest of the year is left to the professionals to handle the singing (except, perhaps, some alone time in the shower or car).</p>
<p>Music – and singing in particular, as the oldest and only ubiquitous form of music creation – plays a central role in our lives and shared community experiences, and this has been true for every culture for as far back as we can trace our <a href="http://msx.sagepub.com/content/12/1_suppl/147.short">human ancestors</a>. </p>
<p>So does singing in a group provide specific and tangible benefits, or is it merely a curious ability that provides entertainment through creative expression?</p>
<p>This is a question currently of great interest to evolutionary theorists, linguists, psychologists and musicologists. The debate took off when psychologist <a href="http://stevenpinker.com/biocv">Steven Pinker</a> stated his opinion that music is a spandrel – a useless evolutionary by-product of another, useful, trait. In this case, he <a href="http://pinker.wjh.harvard.edu/articles/media/1998_02_07_independentsunday.html">suggested</a> that music is a spandrel of language development, providing no advantage and serving no purpose. </p>
<p>There are strong links between music and language development, although there is no consensus on the actual nature of the relationship. <a href="http://books.google.com.au/books?hl=en&lr=&id=5N-5ufxUuJkC&oi=fnd&pg=PR7&dq=mithen+language+music&ots=Nmz7BqWOGN&sig=cORWFrjZRXp0u0foYweaNXpVgsA&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=mithen%20language%20music&f=false">Arguments</a> include theories that:</p>
<ul>
<li>language developed from music</li>
<li>music sprang from language</li>
<li>they both developed from a proto-language that was musical in nature</li>
<li>they developed concurrently.</li>
</ul>
<p>A <a href="http://pom.sagepub.com/content/33/3/269.short">strong body</a> of <a href="http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/intellect/jaah/2010/00000001/00000001/art00003">research</a> conducted with choirs indicates that membership has many benefits to individual wellbeing and physical health. It is possible these effects are due to people – the singers – participating in something they enjoy doing. Or, there may be something more elemental taking place.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/67200/original/image-20141215-6051-1fxqo67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/67200/original/image-20141215-6051-1fxqo67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/67200/original/image-20141215-6051-1fxqo67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=387&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/67200/original/image-20141215-6051-1fxqo67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=387&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/67200/original/image-20141215-6051-1fxqo67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=387&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/67200/original/image-20141215-6051-1fxqo67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/67200/original/image-20141215-6051-1fxqo67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/67200/original/image-20141215-6051-1fxqo67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/8725928@N02/8067503236">janwillemsen/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>If these findings are viewed through an evolutionary lens, though, there is compelling evidence that music making provided some very specific benefits for our ancestors. Specifically, there are three theories which have been proposed that, if true, may explain these effects while suggesting that group singing is still beneficial to all:</p>
<ol>
<li>singing creates a shared emotional experience</li>
<li>singing increases social bonding</li>
<li>singing improves cognitive function.</li>
</ol>
<h2>Sing us a song, you’re the hominid</h2>
<p>Our hominid ancestors used music to create <a href="http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/40285265?uid=2&uid=4&sid=21105364197793">shared emotional experiences</a>. This would have been particularly important for early hominids struggling to survive, because emotions serve as a kind of “red flag” to our cognitive processing systems, signalling that something critical requires attention. </p>
<p>Emotions prioritise the many options that we may have at any given time, and reduces “data overload” from the bombardment of senses that we experience. Hominids, like many other primates, could have developed very small social groups, or even no social groups. </p>
<p>But the ability for a large group to work cooperatively together was more advantageous than individuals attempting to survive alone. In order to cooperate, individuals needed to subsume their individual priorities for action, and learn to delay gratification so that the good of the group could take precedence (such as forgoing eating or sleeping in order to build a shelter). Group singing likely provided a rewarding, positive activity where emotional empathy could be developed.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/AARrVAHnkdY?wmode=transparent&start=131" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Only Boys Aloud at a Britain’s Got Talent audition.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We know that interacting with music today is, for <a href="https://theconversation.com/video-why-some-people-just-dont-like-music-28605">almost everyone</a>, both an emotional and overwhelmingly positive experience. Music is also used to reinforce positive moods and manage negative moods. Adolescents regularly use music as an effective <a href="http://pom.sagepub.com/content/35/1/88.short">mood regulator</a>. </p>
<p>Others put music to targeted purposes; many athletes use music to put them in a mood state that supports peak performance (and research shows it to be an <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25202850">effective strategy</a>). Music’s ability to change or reinforce a mood relies on the same principle of emotion contagion. </p>
<h2>Social significance</h2>
<p>Second, music engagement would likely have led to increased <a href="http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-1-4615-1221-9_9#page-1">pro-social behaviours</a>. This would be supported by a shared emotional state, which relies on empathic skills (empathy) to spread. </p>
<p>But music is also at the centre of where we first learn to be sociable – in the <a href="http://msx.sagepub.com/content/3/1_suppl/29.short">mother-infant bond</a>. Infants are mesmerised by their mothers’ infant-directed singing. It is a communication tool between mother and infant, and is highly companionable in nature. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/66953/original/image-20141211-6057-bmefis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/66953/original/image-20141211-6057-bmefis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/66953/original/image-20141211-6057-bmefis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66953/original/image-20141211-6057-bmefis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66953/original/image-20141211-6057-bmefis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66953/original/image-20141211-6057-bmefis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66953/original/image-20141211-6057-bmefis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66953/original/image-20141211-6057-bmefis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/drstrangeglove/5060393739">Mary Helen Leonard/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Listening to a mother sing has an immediate and profound impact on an infant’s arousal and attention, including physical responses. These musical communications are highly effective despite the infant not understanding the linguistics involved. They are also universal; lullabies are recognisable as such in virtually <a href="http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/pmu/10/2/73/">every culture</a> on Earth.</p>
<p>There are strong indications that group music making and social behaviours are still linked today. Individuals with <a href="http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/40300863?uid=2&uid=4&sid=21105364472083">Williams Syndrome</a>, in addition to profound cognitive deficits, are known for both their love of music and their incredible sociability.</p>
<p>Music therapy has been shown to reliably <a href="http://summaries.cochrane.org/CD004381/BEHAV_music-therapy-for-people-with-autism-spectrum-disorder">improve social behaviours</a> in individuals on the autism spectrum. Choir members consistently report that <a href="http://rsh.sagepub.com/content/121/4/248.short">social bonds</a> are one of the primary benefits of choir membership. </p>
<p>More experimental studies indicate that instrumental jazz musicians use the <a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/charles_limb_your_brain_on_improv?language=en">communication centres</a> of their brains when coordinating play, and that guitarists and even audience members experience synchronised brain waves when a duet is played (see video below). </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/DQwDVf3ydUM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Studies also show that musical interactions increase both <a href="http://pom.sagepub.com/content/41/4/484.short">empathy</a> and <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1090513810000462">pro-social behaviours</a> in children. </p>
<p>Taken together, the evidence points to a strong link between co-creation of music and improved social bonding.</p>
<h2>Getting ahead</h2>
<p>Finally, evolutionary theorists argue that it was their musicality that allowed hominids to develop what is known as the “<a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/content/317/5843/1344.short">social brain</a>”, while others argue that the complex brain we enjoy today developed to keep track of large social networks. It may have been a bit of both.</p>
<p>By creating a shared emotional experience and increasing members’ pro-social behaviours, group singing supported complex social networks. Tracking and managing complex social networks may have led to the development of the neocortex. This brain region supports the suite of abilities known as <a href="http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/executive+function">executive function</a>, which provide the skills necessary to make and implement long-term plans. </p>
<p>It also supports cognitive flexibility, which is a style of fluid cognition that allows humans to successfully pair concepts that don’t generally go together, resulting in creative, insightful, and elegant ideas and solutions. </p>
<p>We already know that a positive mood state <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1057740801703129">supports</a> cognitive flexibility, while stress and anxiety act as <a href="http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/jocn.2007.19.3.468#.VI6nV3s2V4M">inhibitors</a>. Co-creating music may support improved cognitive skills through other pathways as well, although these links have not been explored.</p>
<p>Of course all theories concerning the use of music by early hominid groups is conjecture, resting on the scant pieces of evidence the fossil record leaves us as well as what we know about our own musicality today. But the questions are important, because it can inform us about our own relationship to music. </p>
<p>If the theories outlined here are correct, it may benefit us both as individuals and as a community to normalise and promote music co-creation. Participating in singing ought to be more than a once-a-year activity.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/35367/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Susan Maury does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>We’re enjoying the one time of year when protests of “I can’t sing!” are laid aside and we sing carols with others. For some this is a once-a-year special event; the rest of the year is left to the professionals…Susan Maury, PhD candidate in Psychology, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/286052014-07-02T02:49:31Z2014-07-02T02:49:31ZVIDEO: Why some people just don’t like music<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/52838/original/2qpxfx8x-1404269408.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption"></span> </figcaption></figure><figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Ix5Gxun7VCk?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>For many people, enjoying music results in noticeable physical reactions – sweaty palms or a shiver down the spine. Music can cause the release of dopamine in your body, which provides a feeling of immense pleasure and reward.</p>
<p>But this sensation is not shared by all. As Nikki Rickard explains, there are people – referred to as “music anhedonics” – for who there is no physical response to music. For them, music is simply not enjoyable.</p>
<p>This video is a co-production between <a href="http://www.sbs.com.au/news/">SBS World News</a> and The Conversation.</p>
<p><strong>See also:</strong><br>
<a href="https://theconversation.com/chills-and-thrills-why-some-people-love-music-and-others-dont-24007">Chills and thrills: why some people love music – and others don’t</a><br>
<a href="https://theconversation.com/video-why-older-adults-love-online-dating-27994">VIDEO: Why older adults love online dating<br></a>
<a href="https://theconversation.com/video-are-raw-foods-good-for-you-27711">VIDEO: Are raw foods good for you?</a><br>
<a href="https://theconversation.com/video-coworking-the-benefits-of-collaborative-workspaces-27443">VIDEO: Coworking – the benefits of collaborative workspaces</a><br>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nikki Rickard currently receives funding from the Australian Research Council and beyondblue. </span></em></p>For many people, enjoying music results in noticeable physical reactions – sweaty palms or a shiver down the spine. Music can cause the release of dopamine in your body, which provides a feeling of immense…Nikki Rickard, Associate Professor of Psychology, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/240072014-03-06T19:38:20Z2014-03-06T19:38:20ZChills and thrills: why some people love music – and others don’t<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/43122/original/bvj3f6hm-1393980462.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">'I'm walkin' on sunshine, whoooa oh! And don't it feel good!'</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/astragony/6426608875/sizes/l/">Daniele Zedda/Flickr (cropped)</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Think of your favourite piece of music. Do you get shivers when the music swells or the chorus kicks in? Or are the opening few bars enough to make you feel tingly?</p>
<p>Despite having no obvious survival value, listening to music can be a highly rewarding activity. It’s one of the most pleasurable activities with which people engage.</p>
<p>But in a <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2014.01.068">study published today</a> in Current Biology, Spanish and Canadian researchers report on a group of “music anhedonics” – literally, those who do not enjoy music. </p>
<p>This is an intriguing phenomenon, and we presume very rare. </p>
<p>Importantly, these people are not “<a href="http://www.karger.com/Article/FullText/206851">amusic</a>” – an affliction that often results from acquired or congenital damage to parts of the brain required to perceive or interpret music. In this study, the “music anhedonics” perceive music in the same way as the rest of the population.</p>
<p>Nor are they people who generally don’t enjoy pleasure – they are not depressed, nor highly inhibited, and they are just as sensitive as other people to other types of non-musical rewards (such as food, money, sex, exercise and drugs). </p>
<p>They simply don’t experience chills or similar responses to pleasurable music in the way that other people do. They’re just not that into music.</p>
<h2>I’ve got chills – they’re multiplying</h2>
<p>When we listen to pleasurable music, the “<a href="http://www.psychologytoday.com/basics/dopamine">pleasure chemical</a>” dopamine is <a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/content/340/6129/216.short">released in the striatum</a>, a key part of the <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1196/annals.1390.002/abstract?deniedAccessCustomisedMessage=&userIsAuthenticated=false">brain’s reward system</a>. </p>
<p>Importantly, music activates the striatum just like other rewarding stimuli, such as food and sex. During anticipation of the peak – or “<a href="http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v506/n7489/full/506433a.html">hotspot</a>” as music psychologist <a href="http://slobodajohn.wix.com/johns">John Sloboda</a> calls it – in the music, dopamine is released in the dorsal (or upper) striatum. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/43120/original/j7c7x6zr-1393979990.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/43120/original/j7c7x6zr-1393979990.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/43120/original/j7c7x6zr-1393979990.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=623&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43120/original/j7c7x6zr-1393979990.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=623&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43120/original/j7c7x6zr-1393979990.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=623&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43120/original/j7c7x6zr-1393979990.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=783&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43120/original/j7c7x6zr-1393979990.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=783&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43120/original/j7c7x6zr-1393979990.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=783&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/madalyn_k/4584366317/sizes/l/">madalyn_k/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
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<p>During the peak, when we experience chills and other signs that our body’s <a href="http://psychology.about.com/od/aindex/g/autonomic-nervous-system.htm">autonomic nervous system</a> – responsible for regulating involuntary body functions – is being aroused, dopamine is released in the nearby ventral striatum. </p>
<p>So what’s going on in the brains of music anhedonics?</p>
<p>The authors offer a neurobiological explanation. While many types of pleasurable stimuli activate the same broad reward circuit in the brain, there are some differences depending on the type of stimulus. It is possible that the pattern of brain regions specifically activated by music pleasure, including the connection from auditory regions which perceive music to the reward centres, are slightly different in these individuals than in other people. </p>
<p>This isn’t unusual as we know that there can be enormous differences in how rewarding (and potentially addictive) other rewards such as food, sex, money and drugs can be to different individuals, but it is rare to get no pleasurable response to these rewards. Is the story more complex then?</p>
<h2>Bittersweet symphony</h2>
<p>Music is a complex phenomenon – it affects us in multiple ways, and is used for many purposes. While pleasure is a popular reason for music listening, we are also drawn to music for other reasons. Sometimes the music isn’t pleasant at all. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/8SM2FrsY4Gg?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">‘Pleasant’ is subjective, of course.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Our attraction, our need, and sometimes perhaps dependence on sad, angry or even frightening music flies in the face of evolutionary theory – why seek out something emotionally negative? </p>
<p>Insight into our uses of music is however being achieved via music psychology – a rapidly expanding field which draws on research across numerous domains including cognitive neuroscience, social psychology and <a href="http://link.springer.com/book/10.1007%2F11573548">affective computing</a> (the science of human-computer interaction where the device can detect and respond to its user’s emotions).</p>
<p>In a <a href="http://ukcatalogue.oup.com/product/9780199695225.do">study</a> involving more than 1,000 people, Swedish music psychologist <a href="http://www.oru.se/Intern/Organisation/Institutioner/Musik/Konferenser/CV/Alf%20Gabrielsson.pdf">Alf Gabrielsson</a> showed that only a little over half of strong experiences with music involve positive emotions. </p>
<p>Many involved “mixed emotions” (think nostalgic or bittersweet love songs), and about one in ten involve negative emotions. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/43123/original/2xxc2gng-1393981426.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/43123/original/2xxc2gng-1393981426.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/43123/original/2xxc2gng-1393981426.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=342&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43123/original/2xxc2gng-1393981426.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=342&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43123/original/2xxc2gng-1393981426.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=342&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43123/original/2xxc2gng-1393981426.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43123/original/2xxc2gng-1393981426.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43123/original/2xxc2gng-1393981426.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
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<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/williambrawley/4084963522/sizes/l/">William Brawley/Flickr (cropped)</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>‘Non-positive’ can be good</h2>
<p>We listen to music that makes us feel like this for many reasons. We can use it to help express how we’re feeling – sometimes this might make the problem worse (such as when we use music to ruminate), but other times it helps to give voice to an emotion we otherwise could not communicate. </p>
<p>As a result, we may feel more emotionally aware or stable afterwards. </p>
<p>We also use music to solve problems, to look at our situation in a different light, to energise us or to relax us, and often to avoid or distract us – all well-known strategies for managing or regulating emotions. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/vg_yl9Ctq6Q?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">How about some tech house to energise you …</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/TZMoS2QBc8U?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">… or some new age relaxation tunes to chill out.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Music can also help us connect to others. Even if we don’t get a buzz from the music normally, when we listen with others, the enhanced social connectivity can be highly satisfying. </p>
<p>A <a href="http://pom.sagepub.com/content/early/2012/05/01/0305735612440615">2012 study</a> showed that individuals who listened to music with close friends or their partners showed significantly stronger autonomic responses than those who listened alone. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/43121/original/ksry4cn2-1393980320.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/43121/original/ksry4cn2-1393980320.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/43121/original/ksry4cn2-1393980320.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43121/original/ksry4cn2-1393980320.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43121/original/ksry4cn2-1393980320.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43121/original/ksry4cn2-1393980320.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43121/original/ksry4cn2-1393980320.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/43121/original/ksry4cn2-1393980320.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/m4rten/8107686919/sizes/l/">xmartenx/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We might better empathise with the emotional or mental states of others, and at times, music feels like a “virtual friend”, providing solace and comfort when needed, and perhaps even stimulating release of the stress reducing and affiliation hormone <a href="http://www.psychologytoday.com/basics/oxytocin">oxytocin</a>. </p>
<p>All these uses of music can be beneficial for our “<a href="http://www.academia.edu/3179324/Eudaimonic_Well-Being_as_a_Core_Concept_of_Positive_Functioning">eudaimonic well-being</a>”; in other words, for enhancing our engagement and purpose in life, rather than just our pleasure. </p>
<p>They also involve a distributed set of connected brain regions other than just the reward circuit. This means that these positive effects of music may be preserved even when the typical pleasure response is not experienced. </p>
<p>Another feature of music that distinguishes it from many other rewarding stimuli is that it is an artform. And as an artform, it can be appreciated aesthetically, in an intellectual or analytical – rather than emotional – manner. </p>
<p>We can listen to a piece oozing with tragedy such as Albinoni’s Adagio in G minor or Trent Reznor’s Hurt – listen below – but feel awe and beauty in the sophisticated score of the composer and perfect execution of the performers. This might explain why some of the music anhedonics in this study still reported feeling some pleasure to music, even when their bodies weren’t along for the ride.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/XMbvcp480Y4?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/YmQ_ANFOo1M?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Reward circuitry is also activated by aesthetically beautiful stimuli, but other frontal brain regions involved in aesthetic judgment are also activated. It may be possible then for music anhedonics to still appreciate and enjoy music, even if their reward brain circuitry differs a little from those of us who can experience intense physical responses to music. </p>
<p>And of course, music anhedonics might still find music a useful way to express or regulate their own emotions, and to connect to others. Or are music anhedonics also music “aneudaimonics”? </p>
<p>In fact, we know so little about this fascinating, previously “hidden” phenomenon that this study opens the door for so many more studies – which is rewarding all of itself.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/24007/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nikki Rickard has received funding from the ARC, CASS Foundation, Collier Charitable Fund and Reach Foundation.</span></em></p>Think of your favourite piece of music. Do you get shivers when the music swells or the chorus kicks in? Or are the opening few bars enough to make you feel tingly? Despite having no obvious survival value…Nikki Rickard, Associate Professor of Psychology, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/199152013-11-06T11:51:27Z2013-11-06T11:51:27ZThe rhythm of life<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/34610/original/wj8fkhgn-1383784440.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Music affects all of us -- even in utero.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Petar</span></span></figcaption></figure><figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/34610/original/wj8fkhgn-1383784440.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/34610/original/wj8fkhgn-1383784440.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/34610/original/wj8fkhgn-1383784440.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/34610/original/wj8fkhgn-1383784440.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/34610/original/wj8fkhgn-1383784440.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/34610/original/wj8fkhgn-1383784440.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/34610/original/wj8fkhgn-1383784440.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Music affects all of us – even in utero.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Petar</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Music psychologist and jazz pianist <a href="http://www.roehampton.ac.uk/staff/David-Hargreaves/">David Hargreaves</a> of Roehampton University is probably the only professor to have opened the bill for Chuck Berry. But last week he beat even that.</p>
<p>At a time when the threatened US Government shutdown nearly crippled the global economy over the introduction of Obamacare, David’s team got worldwide publicity for their <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-24660048">research</a> showing that hospitalised children experience less pain simply if they hear songs like See-Saw Marjorie Daw.</p>
<figure>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">David Hargreaves’ TEDx talk on music and the mind.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This is startling enough but, in a world in which finance limits healthcare as much as does medical knowledge, it hints that music could have a dramatic effect on the well-being of billions. </p>
<p>In fact, dozens of experiments have shown that listening to music has a variety of direct health benefits. It can reduce the amount of pain-killing medication that patients need post-operatively, reduce blood pressure, reduce the length of comas, regulate the breathing of premature babies, or even reduce the length of labour (except for my wife, who to this day is taken to a very dark place by The Cult’s Brother Wolf, Sister Moon: I’m taking this chance to apologise publicly). </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/15pYF4WM27g?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>We know that the health benefits of music are greater for women than men, children rather than infants or adults, if the music is live rather than pre-recorded, or if the pain is temporary, from say a careless dentist, rather than from deep tissue damage.</p>
<p>Why? We just don’t know for sure. In the case of pain, one possibility is that the music is simply a distraction from the dentist’s drill; in the case of comas, music might be effective simply because it can arouse the brain; and in the case of babies’ respiration rate, the music provides an obvious rhythm that breathing can follow.</p>
<p>And these positive effects of music on children’s health can even be identified during pregnancy.</p>
<p>One experiment showed that when pregnant women watched Neighbours every day the theme music could soothe the babies soon after they were born: everybody needs good neighbours, but infants need cheesy TV theme tunes.</p>
<p>Another experiment asked pregnant women to wear a belt containing speakers playing music pointing inwards, with the effect that the children’s movements, memory, and social skills developed more quickly after they were born.</p>
<p>I wonder if they make one that plays Brother Wolf, Sister Moon.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/35qJ0UdJjLo?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Brother Wolf, Sister Moon.</span></figcaption>
</figure><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/19915/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
Music psychologist and jazz pianist David Hargreaves of Roehampton University is probably the only professor to have opened the bill for Chuck Berry. But last week he beat even that. At a time when the…Adrian North, Head of School of Psychology and Speech Pathology, Curtin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/159992013-07-11T20:38:45Z2013-07-11T20:38:45ZMusic and walking speed – it’s not what you think<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/27313/original/6h3ppk7r-1373521060.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">What's the best music for a slow stroll, or a pumping powerwalk? There are factors other than tempo to take into account.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">ejorpin</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>“Music has charms to soothe a savage breast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak,” wrote the English poet William Congreve in 1697. </p>
<p>These days, we tend to take music’s inherent charms for granted and often overlook how genuinely mysterious it is that simple patterns of sound vibrations can have profound effects on our minds and bodies. This power of music to on the one hand soothe, but equally to energise, has long fascinated musicians and philosophers. </p>
<p>Most recently, psychologists and neurophysiologists have turned their attention to music, and have sought to measure, and explain in empirical terms, how music can have so much influence over our moods and levels of energy.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/27315/original/nst9jqk2-1373522805.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/27315/original/nst9jqk2-1373522805.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/27315/original/nst9jqk2-1373522805.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27315/original/nst9jqk2-1373522805.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27315/original/nst9jqk2-1373522805.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27315/original/nst9jqk2-1373522805.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27315/original/nst9jqk2-1373522805.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27315/original/nst9jqk2-1373522805.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="attribution"><span class="source">istolethetv</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>A Belgian study <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0067932">published in PLoS ONE</a> on Wednesday has shed some further light on how this might work. Marc Leman and colleagues at the Institute for Psychoacoustics and Electronic Music and Ghent University analysed the effects of listening to different pieces of music on the walking speed of 18 adults. </p>
<p>Researchers have long known that people will synchronise their steps with the tempo of music – after all, this is why we have marching bands. So for this study, the researchers chose 52 pieces of instrumental music with contrasting moods and styles, but exactly the same musical tempo: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwXYUdGHZ0Q">130 beats per minute</a>.</p>
<p>Sure enough, almost all of the participants stepped in time with the music. What was more interesting was that certain pieces of music caused the participants to walk more energetically – to take larger strides, and cover a larger total distance – while other pieces caused the opposite effect.</p>
<p>For the record, the piece of music that created the most vigorous walking in the study was Falik’s Ballad of El Efe, below:</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Ri7KzLwc5DU?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>While the gentlest response was to Monsieur Saint-Colombe’s Courante, below:</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/XXUzWZM1wMg?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>After the walking test, the participants were asked to rate the pieces they listened to in terms of opposed pairs of adjectives: was the piece good or bad? Stuttering or flowing? Tender or aggressive? Soft or loud? </p>
<p>Unsurprisingly, the participants walked with more of a spring in their step to music rated as stuttering, loud or aggressive, while gentler, softer, flowing or more complex music had a relaxing effect.</p>
<p>This effect appeared to be independent of musical genre: the list of the most arousing music included classical, techno, world music and house, while the top ten most relaxing pieces ranged from Baroque solo viol music to contemporary Korean dance tracks. </p>
<p>The effect also seemed to be independent of the participants’ own musical preferences – the music had the observed effect whether or not the participants liked that particular style or genre. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/27317/original/qk7dbfb2-1373522935.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/27317/original/qk7dbfb2-1373522935.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/27317/original/qk7dbfb2-1373522935.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27317/original/qk7dbfb2-1373522935.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27317/original/qk7dbfb2-1373522935.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27317/original/qk7dbfb2-1373522935.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27317/original/qk7dbfb2-1373522935.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27317/original/qk7dbfb2-1373522935.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Zervas</span></span>
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<p>Leman and colleagues speculate that this musical effect on the vigour of physical response might happen at an autonomous or subliminal level. This suggests several possible practical applications for the research, for instance in sports performance or physical rehabilitation.</p>
<h2>Arouse and relax</h2>
<p>What makes this study relatively unusual is that the researchers then analysed these objective cognitive results in terms of a sophisticated music theoretical model: they attempted to discover exactly what the musical features were that were associated with the arousing or relaxing effects. </p>
<p>Nearly 200 sonic features of each piece were analysed – the loudness of various parts of music, the sharpness of the <a href="http://www.musicarrangers.com/star-theory/t08.htm">attack</a>, the structure of the beats, the distribution of pitches and so on – and this musical analysis was then correlated with the results of the walking experiment. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/27321/original/bbjd86b6-1373523167.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/27321/original/bbjd86b6-1373523167.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/27321/original/bbjd86b6-1373523167.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=854&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27321/original/bbjd86b6-1373523167.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=854&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27321/original/bbjd86b6-1373523167.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=854&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27321/original/bbjd86b6-1373523167.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1073&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27321/original/bbjd86b6-1373523167.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1073&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/27321/original/bbjd86b6-1373523167.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1073&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">trekker308</span></span>
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<p>Surprisingly, only a handful of features were shown to cause arousal and relaxation, and these all had to do with the regular structure of the rhythm, which musicians call “metre”. </p>
<p>Put simplistically, music with a march-like rhythm (“binary metre”) causes more arousal, while music with a waltz-like rhythm (“ternary metre”) causes greater relaxation.</p>
<p>So when you next see a batsman stride to the crease or a boxer enter the ring to the blare of aggressive, pounding motivational music, it’s more than just theatre. There’s a genuine physiological effect at work. </p>
<p>And it might be that England’s best chance to retain the Ashes will be to make sure the Australian team takes the field to the sound of the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CTYymbbEL4">Blue Danube Waltz</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/15999/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jonathan Powles does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>“Music has charms to soothe a savage breast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak,” wrote the English poet William Congreve in 1697. These days, we tend to take music’s inherent charms for granted and…Jonathan Powles, Associate Professor and Director, Academic Skills at the University of Canberra, University of CanberraLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/147372013-05-29T06:02:01Z2013-05-29T06:02:01ZStuck like a Baroque-n record? Music evolves in noteworthy ways<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/24593/original/kmzz88nw-1369798388.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Over the course of 200 years, music evolved into very distinct styles, each distinguished by melodic interval analysis.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mira (on the wall)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Think of your favourite piece of music. What aspects of its melody do you really like? Do you prefer a mix of fast and slow notes or an even tempo; do you like listening to low, bass-driven music more than high-pitched notes; or have you a preference for a single instrument or many playing together?</p>
<p>It’s easy to see there’s more to liking a piece of music than a catchy riff or easy-to-remember lyrics. Most people’s music tastes, from opera to thrash metal, have a common quality: the presence of pitch differences between notes, called melodic intervals. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/24591/original/7vqtqjn7-1369796314.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/24591/original/7vqtqjn7-1369796314.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/24591/original/7vqtqjn7-1369796314.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=904&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/24591/original/7vqtqjn7-1369796314.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=904&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/24591/original/7vqtqjn7-1369796314.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=904&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/24591/original/7vqtqjn7-1369796314.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1135&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/24591/original/7vqtqjn7-1369796314.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1135&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/24591/original/7vqtqjn7-1369796314.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1135&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Nabeel H</span></span>
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<p>As an interval can be defined as a difference in pitch between two notes, they can rise and fall. (Notes that do neither are treated as repetitions of the same pitch, itself a common feature in all music.)</p>
<p>Melodic intervals allow the listener to anticipate (to a degree) the composition of the track and have <a href="http://asadl.org/jasa/resource/1/jasman/v10/i3/p256_s1">long been thought</a> to play a key role in musical preference. </p>
<p>And it turns out this particular element of music also evolves over time, according to a paper <a href="http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2013/05/22/1222336110">published yesterday</a> in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.</p>
<h2>Musical evolution</h2>
<p>Using a digital database of music from 1730 to 1930, researchers from Argentina and the US <a href="http://liaa.dc.uba.ar/?q=node/92">analysed</a> melodic interval patterns of four music styles:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://www.baroque.org/baroque/">Baroque</a>. Music in the Baroque period (1600-1750) expanded the complexity of instrumentation, and established genres such as opera and sonata. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Sebastian_Bach">Bach</a> and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Frideric_Handel">Handel</a> were Baroque composers.</li>
<li><a href="http://web.ku.edu/%7Ecmed/private/classical.html">Classical</a>. From around 1750-1820, the Classical era gave rise to music less complex and usually shorter than that in the Baroque style. The best known composers include <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_van_Beethoven">Beethoven</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfgang_Amadeus_Mozart">Mozart</a>.</li>
<li><a href="http://www.ipl.org/div/mushist/rom/">Romantic</a>. From around 1815 to 1910, composers from the Romantic era (such as <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fr%C3%A9d%C3%A9ric_Chopin">Chopin</a> and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johannes_Brahms">Brahms</a>) created music for the middle class, whereas in the past such compositions were usually reserved for the upper classes only.</li>
<li><a href="http://www.classicalarchives.com/period/7.html">Post-Romantic</a>. Music from the post-Romantic era (from the late 19th century onwards) incorporated aspects from the Baroque and Classical periods, but still retained Romantic elements.</li>
</ul>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/gVVHSfvrBmg?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">From the Baroque era …</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/oA0kXDMKiLg?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">… to post-Romantic.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Interval analysis of music focuses on the building-blocks of pitch contour that, for instance, give rise to recognisable melody. </p>
<p>The researchers found Romantic and post-Romantic styles increasingly embraced notes outside the more tidy dependence on tonal predictability that, to a greater extent, characterises Baroque and Classical music. </p>
<h2>Beyond intervals</h2>
<p>It is important to recognise that while interval sampling is an efficient search for elements of music that clearly affect its perception, it does not (and cannot) replicate the means by which most people listen to music. </p>
<p>This study doesn’t examine intrinsic factors such as note durations and the rhythmic patterns that arise from these – arguably as crucial to the stylistic features of music as pitch – as well as the timbres assigned to the means of performance, whether a trumpet, an organ, or an unaccompanied choir. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ItZyaOlrb7E?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Or a really happy drummer.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>What really determines music style is the interaction between many different parameters. Music is multi-modal in this respect, and as well as sound-based factors such as melodic intervals, style also encompasses elements such as lyrical meaning, its narrative, and - above all in the case of Baroque and Classical music - the dance steps popular at the time of composition.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/24590/original/mg84s8dj-1369796103.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/24590/original/mg84s8dj-1369796103.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/24590/original/mg84s8dj-1369796103.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/24590/original/mg84s8dj-1369796103.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/24590/original/mg84s8dj-1369796103.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/24590/original/mg84s8dj-1369796103.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/24590/original/mg84s8dj-1369796103.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/24590/original/mg84s8dj-1369796103.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="attribution"><span class="source">alika89</span></span>
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<p>The melding of neuroscience and music <a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/content/340/6129/216">showed last month</a> that certain types of music can trigger reward systems in the brain. </p>
<p>Now, a developing international sub-discipline of computational musicology, hosted both in music departments and in laboratories dedicated to computer science and experimental psychology, are developing robust statistical processes such as the one applied in this study.</p>
<p>Music science stands to benefit enormously from the development of new tools of the kind employed here. </p>
<p>In turn, performers have much to gain from understanding what is important in the material we sing and play that captures the attention - and hearts - of our audience.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/14737/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nicholas Bannan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Think of your favourite piece of music. What aspects of its melody do you really like? Do you prefer a mix of fast and slow notes or an even tempo; do you like listening to low, bass-driven music more…Nicholas Bannan, Professor in Music Education, The University of Western AustraliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/140202013-05-28T05:46:58Z2013-05-28T05:46:58ZJazz musicians can teach surgeons how to improvise<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/24155/original/xmvychcw-1369064009.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C1024%2C680&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Musician Courtney Pine might not be able to operate in A&amp;E but his work has some similarities to surgery.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Flickr/Richard Kaby</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>What could music and surgery have in common? At first sight, not much. Operations aren’t done on stage in front of a large crowd - and nobody dies after a concert if someone plays a wrong note. </p>
<p>As an amateur keyboard player with minimal talent by night, and a surgeon with a love of music by day - especially Baroque and jazz - I’m struck by a string of parallels, starting with the language we share.</p>
<p>As surgeons, we use instruments to perform in an operating theatre. Musicians and surgeons both rely on precise but wordless communication, dexterity built through years of practice and the ability to respond to the unexpected.</p>
<p>We may only be watched by one or two people but every operation is still a performance. There’s a beginning, a middle and an end, and as a soloist, no going back once you’ve started. </p>
<p>There’s a similar sense of immediacy and intensity. How do you describe the fear and excitement of the moment when you step out onto the concert platform, or open the abdomen of a seriously injured patient to find out what’s wrong? Or when you realise that things have taken a different twist and you have to do something you’ve never been taught? </p>
<p>Working as a team or an ensemble making split second decisions or keeping the show on the road even if you’re not sure you can handle a situation that’s rapidly going downhill can give surgeons and musicians a similar feeling. Surgeons are often seen only in a professional light but as individuals our experience can be very emotional.</p>
<p>I started wondering how to explore the parallels between surgery and music. I talked to classical performers, jazz artists, orchestral conductors and composers. But immediately I hit a problem: it’s very difficult to put some of these feelings into words. Sooner or later you need to do.</p>
<h2>Repeated actions</h2>
<p>Almost any discipline involves unspoken ways of doing. When I learnt to operate I spent endless hours tying knots with one hand, practising with a piece of string over the back of a chair until I could do it in my sleep. </p>
<p>Musicians practice scales until they become automatic. Once these skills have become second nature you can draw on them without having to think. But that also makes them almost impossible to describe to other people. </p>
<p>I’ve been exploring whether simulation - already <a href="http://www.bmj.com/content/338/bmj.b1001">widely used for training surgical teams</a> - could provide a way of sharing experience and bringing tacit practices into view. With a team at Imperial College London I’ve developed a lightweight, portable yet highly realistic simulated operating theatre that allows non-surgeons to feel what surgery is like. </p>
<p>Instead of a real patient on the operating table, we use silicon organs which are scarily realistic and even bleed. But although the patient is artificial, the rest of the team is real - an actual surgeon, scrub nurse and anaesthetist. </p>
<p>By inviting musicians to put on a gown and gloves and take part in an operation that’s as close to the real thing as we can get it, we’ve started exploring the connections between different ways of knowing and doing. And already that’s making me see things differently. </p>
<p>In a collaboration with jazz pianist Liam Noble, for instance, we’ve looked at the idea of improvisation. The ability to improvise is highly valued by jazz artists but few patients would like to think of their surgeon improvising on them. But being able to put together skills in new combinations in response to the unexpected is crucial. Although “resourcefulness” would be a more acceptable term for surgeons. </p>
<p>Again it’s a question of language. Working with musicians has already made me think in unexpected ways. By looking deeply at what we think we know, perhaps we can find ways of doing it better - and this goes for surgeons too.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/14020/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Roger Kneebone is a Wellcome Trust Engagement Fellow</span></em></p>What could music and surgery have in common? At first sight, not much. Operations aren’t done on stage in front of a large crowd - and nobody dies after a concert if someone plays a wrong note. As an amateur…Roger Kneebone, Professor of Surgical Education, Imperial College LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/87642012-09-07T01:51:59Z2012-09-07T01:51:59ZMotion slickness: music moves makers and listeners alike<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/14481/original/mx4b4ygh-1345526619.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Music can create a vortex – and a coupling of cortexes.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AlicePopkorn</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Music is an emotional business. But is it also a natural law, bound in with our bodies and ideas of motion we’re only beginning to understand? </p>
<p>I am in the unique position of studying with both <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/john-rayner-10471">Professor John Rayner</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/jonathan-powles-10298">Dr Jonathan Powles</a>, both of whom have published excellent recent articles on The Conversation (see <a href="https://theconversation.com/this-is-a-love-song-the-physics-of-music-and-the-music-of-physics-7799">here</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/music-and-physics-the-connections-arent-trivial-8188">here</a>) on the tightly-linked subjects of science and music. Ideas touched on by both articles approach a theory of universality in music, based on ideas of motion in both disciplines.</p>
<p>The two concepts of music as a “language of the emotions” and music as a “natural law” might not be as at odds as <a href="https://theconversation.com/music-and-physics-the-connections-arent-trivial-8188"> Powles suggests</a>. </p>
<p>I would propose that in search of a natural law of music, perhaps the ancient Greeks would have better spent their time, instead of studying the movement of celestial bodies, studying the movement of their own corporeal bodies. </p>
<p>The presence of universal gestures in mankind and music hint at order, and modern technology has begun to confirm these suspicions.</p>
<h2>Inside the brain of a musician</h2>
<p>It is easy to imagine cogs whirring in a musician’s brain’s <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_cortex">motor cortex</a> as well as the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_auditory_cortex">auditory cortex</a> during a performance. Be it pressing piano keys, bowing a string or singing a top C, music is a physical act. </p>
<p>Rayner <a href="https://theconversation.com/this-is-a-love-song-the-physics-of-music-and-the-music-of-physics-7799">describes to us</a> the physical action taken by his wife – the operatic soprano Theresa Rayner (see video below) – to produce her lovely singing voice.</p>
<figure>
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</figure>
<p>What’s fascinating to me is the knowledge that those cogs are not only whirring in Theresa’s head, but <a href="http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v6/n7/full/nn1081.html">also in the heads</a> of every member of her lucky audience, whether they are musicians themselves or not.</p>
<p>In fact, if we completely divorce ourselves from the physical act of performing and simply listen, those very same cogs in the motor cortex still spin alongside those in the auditory cortex.</p>
<h2>The human mirror</h2>
<p>This coupling of cortexes is by no means unique to music. Of particular interest is our use of the motor cortex in processing emotion. Just as with music and its performer, use of the motor cortex for emotion is not limited to just the person experiencing the emotion, but also to their “audience”. </p>
<p>We identify other people’s emotions from countless things, including <a href="http://www.nature.com/nrn/journal/v7/n3/full/nrn1872.html">physical gestures</a>. Many emotions are <a href="http://www.nbb.cornell.edu/neurobio/land/oldstudentprojects/cs490-95to96/hjkim/emotions.html">universal</a> and our physical expression of them is (largely) <a href="https://theconversation.com/surprise-facial-expressions-arent-necessarily-universal-6767">recognisable across cultures</a>. The video, below, by <a href="http://billviolaosuart.blogspot.com.au/2010/03/silent-mountain.html">Bill Viola</a>, is illustrative of this. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/oA9BG5aOD64?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>If we see a figure hunched over and shuffling along slowly, our brain can “mirror” that figure’s emotion, complete with a few revolutions of the corresponding cogs in our motor cortex – a process known as the “<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror_neuron">human mirror neuron system</a>” – and through it we <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/10/science/10mirr.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all">experience empathy</a>. </p>
<p>Our brain imitates the emotion of the figure, and we mirror his or her emotion in our brain and understand that he or she is “sad”.</p>
<h2>Music as a language</h2>
<p>As Powles noted, there is some <a href="http://scienceblogs.com/cognitivedaily/2009/04/08/even-isolated-cultures-underst/">recent evidence</a> to suggest music can act as a “language of the emotions”. Tribe members who had never before been exposed to Western music were able to identify the intended emotion of a musical work.</p>
<p>In Western music, the most common description of emotion reduces to the following: major key = happy; minor key = sad.</p>
<p>Apart from the problem of this leaving out every other emotion in between, this definition is by no means concrete. A skilled composer can depict any emotion they choose regardless of this modality.</p>
<p>In many other cultures the major/minor definition of emotion is swapped, or non-existent. The most joyous Hebrew songs are set in a minor key – as per the video below. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/KxzKWTREzjc?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Song of Ascents, Psalms 121.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>What, then, allows someone from another culture to experience the emotion of a piece of music?</p>
<h2>Motion and a musical language</h2>
<p>In Leondard Bernstein’s operetta <a href="http://www.sondheimguide.com/Candide/contents.html">Candide</a>, the singer’s sadness is a slow, smooth and often descending melody (see video below). </p>
<p>The same too in Maurice Ravel’s <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OgFdId5TLwI&feature=fvst">Pavane</a>, where the motion supersedes our cultural notion of major keys.</p>
<p>These melodies describe to us the motion of our sad, hunched-over individual as surely as seeing him or her with our eyes. Our brain can mirror this motion in much the same way as before. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/bm4SuBwqxjg?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Bernstein gives us wildly over-the-top depictions of these two emotional poles in Glitter and be Gay, from Candide.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>While undoubtedly described in very abstract terms, our brain does appear to relate music to spacial and visual perceptions in a very concrete way. </p>
<p>The perception and representation of motion in music is certainly <a href="http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.1525/mp.2006.23.3.221?uid=3737536&uid=2&uid=4&sid=21100979384993">much more complex</a> and hard to classify than I have suggested, but it is because of this that music is able to convey such complex movements. </p>
<p>Music may not be the pure “language of the emotions” musicologists in the past hoped, but motion has finally given music and emotion some tangible <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2555420/">common ground</a>. </p>
<p>These parallels in the motion of music, and the motion of an emotion, allow our brain to not only translate the music into an emotion, but also let us experience it.</p>
<p>Our brain’s ability to understand the motion of both music and emotion is astounding. As the cogs in our cortexes spin, it transforms listening to music into an act of empathy. </p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/8764/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Music is an emotional business. But is it also a natural law, bound in with our bodies and ideas of motion we’re only beginning to understand? I am in the unique position of studying with both Professor…Jonathan Barakat, Honours Student, Australian National UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/83462012-07-30T03:20:32Z2012-07-30T03:20:32ZWhile my guitar gently speaks: talking up the talk box<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/13490/original/wx3r3w5p-1343309067.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C131%2C1024%2C570&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Does music feel and talk like we do?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">John Mallon Iphoneography</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>A fine musician complemented by a fine musical instrument can communicate a range of strong emotions. But even the best of these combinations cannot speak in the sense of transferring textual information. Which leads to the question: how might a player make a musical instrument “talk”?</p>
<p>One answer is to use a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk_box">talk box</a>, a device that allows the sound of a musical instrument (usually a guitar) to be controlled by the player’s mouth. Since the early 1970s this effect has been used by many musicians – perhaps the most famous is the guitarist <a href="http://www.frampton.com/">Peter Frampton</a>, particularly playing <a href="http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qL2Bz7VCEZM">Do You Feel Like We Do</a> or Show Me the Way.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/zLgeTtYwQ7o?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>The basic device usually consists of a <a href="http://redspade-audio.blogspot.com.au/2010/12/what-is-compression-driver.html">compression driver</a> (essentially a loudspeaker without a large vibrating cone) connected to a long and narrow flexible tube. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/13485/original/5jkhzd8f-1343304559.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/13485/original/5jkhzd8f-1343304559.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/13485/original/5jkhzd8f-1343304559.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=541&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13485/original/5jkhzd8f-1343304559.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=541&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13485/original/5jkhzd8f-1343304559.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=541&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13485/original/5jkhzd8f-1343304559.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=680&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13485/original/5jkhzd8f-1343304559.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=680&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13485/original/5jkhzd8f-1343304559.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=680&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Peter Frampton’s talk box.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Carl Lender</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The other end of this tube is usually attached to a microphone stand. </p>
<p>It is arranged so that the open end can be inserted into the corner of the player’s mouth when that microphone is used. The output of the guitar amplifier can then be connected to the compression driver in the talk box instead of the normal loudspeakers. The sound of the guitar is thus injected into the player’s mouth.</p>
<p>To understand why this can be so effective, we need first to consider the voice. In both speech and singing, vibrations of our <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vocal_folds">vocal folds</a> (small flaps of tissue in our voice box located behind the Adam’s apple) periodically interrupt the airflow from the lungs. </p>
<p>This produces a sound that is rich in <a href="http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/jw/strings.html">harmonics</a>: it has many <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frequency">frequencies</a> present simultaneously. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/13486/original/4szxszdw-1343304777.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/13486/original/4szxszdw-1343304777.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/13486/original/4szxszdw-1343304777.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=635&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13486/original/4szxszdw-1343304777.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=635&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13486/original/4szxszdw-1343304777.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=635&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13486/original/4szxszdw-1343304777.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=798&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13486/original/4szxszdw-1343304777.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=798&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13486/original/4szxszdw-1343304777.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=798&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jeff McNeill</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Depending on the shape of the mouth, this sound is altered in different ways before it emerges from the lips: we say it is filtered by the acoustic <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_resonance">resonances</a> of the <a href="http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/jw/voice.html">vocal tract</a>. Moving our tongue, lips and jaw alters the magnitudes and frequencies of these resonances, and consequently the harmonic content of the voice. </p>
<p>Vowels are particularly important in singing, and they are largely determined by the two resonances at the lowest frequencies.</p>
<p>When a talk box is used, the player simply mimes the intended speech with the tube placed in the mouth. It is now the guitar sound, rich in harmonics, rather than the voice that is filtered by the vocal tract before it reaches the microphone. </p>
<p>The harmonic content of the guitar sound carries the acoustic information about the shape of the mouth so it sounds as if the guitar is talking.</p>
<p>Of course, the guitar input is very different from the input normally generated by the vocal folds, but this does not usually pose any difficulties in comprehension. This is because we are already used to understanding speech that has been produced with different sounds from the vocal folds, e.g. normal voice, falsetto voice, a croaky voice and whispering.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/13487/original/562hzbh2-1343305821.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/13487/original/562hzbh2-1343305821.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/13487/original/562hzbh2-1343305821.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13487/original/562hzbh2-1343305821.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13487/original/562hzbh2-1343305821.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13487/original/562hzbh2-1343305821.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13487/original/562hzbh2-1343305821.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13487/original/562hzbh2-1343305821.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Wah-wah pedal.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">thebarrowboy</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The technology used in the talk box is quite simple. It is thus interesting to consider why they are still used some 40 years later. One alternative might be the “<a href="http://www.geofex.com/article_folders/wahpedl/wahped.htm">wah-wah pedal</a>”, an electronic device of a similar vintage that only adjusts a single resonance. </p>
<p>But this means that, unlike the talk box, it cannot adjust the multiple resonances that are required to mimic speech.</p>
<p>During those intervening 40 years there has also been immense progress in the speed and power of digital signal processing. It is consequently now possible to implement <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vocoder">Vocoder</a> software that operates in real time. </p>
<p>This is capable of replacing the detailed harmonic spectrum of one instrument with the harmonic spectrum of another instrument (usually, but not necessarily, the voice). </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/mSdFu1xdoZk?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">One of the first vocoder machines using telephone-circuitry.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A talk box is different in that the sound is, and can only be, changed in real time. It also has the advantage that the substitution occurs inside the mouth and will be heard by the player in the same fashion as if they were actually speaking. This can make a difference – your recorded voice sounds different from that you hear yourself while speaking.</p>
<p>There is also an interesting parallel with research carried out in the <a href="http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/music/">Acoustics Lab</a> at the University of New South Wales. We also inject a signal into the mouth from a tube located just outside the mouth, but instead of the sound from a guitar we use a carefully synthesised sound. </p>
<p>This sound contains a large number of frequency components, and this allows precise measurements of the resonance frequencies of the vocal tract. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/VX5v-S_jGD4?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Stevie Wonder using a talk box.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Measuring the acoustics of the vocal tract in this fashion has allowed us to determine how singers adjust the resonances of their tract to match harmonics of the sung pitch. </p>
<p>That’s particularly important when singing at high pitch. It has also revealed how musicians can use their vocal tract while playing musical instruments such as the didgeridoo, saxophone and clarinet.</p>
<p>The simple concepts behind the talk box have thus not only allowed guitars to talk – they have also helped discover how singers and wind players use their vocal tracts in musical performance.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/8346/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John R. Smith receives funding from the Australian Research Council.</span></em></p>A fine musician complemented by a fine musical instrument can communicate a range of strong emotions. But even the best of these combinations cannot speak in the sense of transferring textual information…John R. Smith, Associate Professor of Physics, UNSW SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/81882012-07-17T03:42:06Z2012-07-17T03:42:06ZMusic and physics – the connections aren’t trivial<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/13014/original/sbjbxrwt-1342413511.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=4%2C375%2C2807%2C1370&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">"Physics permeates the language we use to describe music, and the concepts we use to understand it."</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Ravages</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>My ANU colleague John Rayner’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/this-is-a-love-song-the-physics-of-music-and-the-music-of-physics-7799">excellent recent article</a>
on the physics of music seemed to touch a nerve with the readership of The Conversation. </p>
<p>Although beautifully framed by the personal and anecdotal – John’s piece was subtitled “a love song” – the issues he explores about the relationship between music and physics go back to the ancient Greeks, and are as old as the disciplines themselves. </p>
<p>It certainly inspired me – a musicologist – to write something from the other side, to meet my scientific colleague in the middle in a speculative conversation about the parallels between our two worlds.</p>
<p>Musical meaning is tantalising and elusive. For most of us, music has the power to reach us profoundly and directly. The temptation is to speak of music as a language: the notion of music as a kind of “language of the emotions” is pervasive, centuries old, and nowadays has some limited empirical <a href="http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/03/090319132909.htm">experimental support</a>. </p>
<p>Most theoretical work now done on <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_semiology">musical semiotics</a> treats music as just another flavour of discourse, another language of signs; albeit one with its own special characteristics.</p>
<p>But this runs against an age-old notion: that
music is a <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/737974">natural law</a>. The medieval concept of “<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musica_universalis">music of the spheres</a>” held that the movement of the celestial bodies – what we now describe as astrophysics – was, at root, musical: the planets move in the heavens according to principles of harmony and resonance, with a set of common <a href="http://ray.tomes.biz/alex.htm">Pythagorean ratios</a> governing both music and cosmology. </p>
<p>Indeed, we music academics are rather nostalgic for the time (in medieval universities) in which music was considered one of the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quadrivium%22%3Equadrivium">four core disciplines</a> alongside astronomy, geometry and arithmetic, and we held pride of place above the three lesser (hence “trivial”) language-based disciplines of logic, grammar and rhetoric.</p>
<h2>Highs and lows</h2>
<p>Physics permeates the language we use to describe music, and the concepts we use to understand it. For instance we
talk about “high” and “low” musical pitch, perhaps without realising how deeply metaphorical this is. </p>
<p>There is no altitude to musical pitch: “high” pitches are caused by faster vibrations than “low” pitches. But we don’t talk about “fast” and “slow” music with reference to pitch (we use those metaphors for something else entirely). </p>
<p>And yet, the notion of musical altitude makes sense if we think about the energy states of the music. If, as
in the excerpt below from Puccini’s opera <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tosca">Tosca</a>, we listen to a soprano sustain a top B flat (as at 2:40 into the recording below), we are aware that she is sustaining a high-energy state, which must eventually relax. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/_OIExoUb8jk?wmode=transparent&start=149" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>The pitch seems invested with the kinetic energy required to produce it (of course, in Tosca’s case she has a literal encounter with the force of gravity, but that’s quite another story).</p>
<p>Singers, wind and brass players expend energy to reach “altitude”, while string players, keyboardists, guitarists and all the rest work no harder for the high notes than the low. </p>
<p>Yet, perhaps because of the centrality of the
human voice to all music, this idea of fighting against musical “gravity” is ubiquitous, whether in a <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2onBnMHLNE&feature=youtu.be&t=8m">Paganini violin concerto</a> or a Jimi Hendrix guitar solo, as per the video below. In music, as in physics, what goes up must come down.</p>
<figure>
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</figure>
<p>And it doesn’t come down just anywhere. Most systems of musical organisation have a fixed point of reference – a pitch that functions as an attractor, pulling the music
towards it. </p>
<p>In Western music, we call this the “[tonic](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonic_(music)”, and most people, regardless of their level of formal musical training, can hear and sing the note to which the music is “pulling”. This idea of gravitational or magnetic attraction to a pitch was arguably the single most important characteristic of Western music between 1600 and 1900, and much music thereafter.</p>
<p>This may be a characteristic of Western music, but in other cultures’ musics, the idea of a point of attraction is often even more powerful, as in the example below from Classical Indian music.</p>
<figure>
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<p>Not all music has a tonic, a fixed point of reference – in 1908 in Vienna <a href="http://www.bookrags.com/biography/arnold-schoenberg/">Arnold Schoenberg</a> famously departed from the principle with the “atonal” concluding movement of his second string quartet (as per the video below), thereby heralding a new and controversial musical age. </p>
<p>By coincidence, three years earlier, across the border in Switzerland, Albert Einstein had thrown the world of physics into disarray by similarly demolishing the idea of a fixed point of reference, in a paper on electromagnetism that described what later would become known as the <a href="https://theconversation.com/explainer-einsteins-theory-of-general-relativity-3481">Special Theory of Relativity</a>.</p>
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</figure>
<h2>Questions and answers</h2>
<p>It’s worth observing that language has nothing resembling this notion of gravity or attraction: to understand this principle in music the metaphors must come from physics. </p>
<p>There are other concepts that bridge the disciplines in the same way. Balance and symmetry are also ideas that are fundamental to musical structure, and that seem to have more of a physical than a linguistic origin. </p>
<p>In classical music, perhaps the most common phrase structure is often described informally (and somewhat puzzlingly, to me) as “question and answer” - or more formally, as “<a href="http://musicalcrematorium.blogspot.com.au/2004/08/antecedentconsequentcause-and-effect.html">antecedent-consequent</a>” - two phrases that complement each other structurally, as in two phrases that make up just the opening eights seconds of Mozart’s Sonata in C KV545 (below).</p>
<figure>
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</figure>
<p>There’s no question that rhetoric plays a role in shaping the way in which these two phrases echo each other. But on a structural level, there is an identity that seems almost mathematical in nature. </p>
<p>The two phrases are in balance: their (gentle) energies are complementary; their shapes are an image of each other; they are like two sides of an equation.</p>
<h2>Time and memory</h2>
<p>For me, the most important parallels between music and physics happen on a more philosophical level.</p>
<p>The late musicologist <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Kramer">Jonathan Kramer</a> started his book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Time-Music-Temporalities-Strategies/dp/0028725905">The Time of Music</a> with the observation that small children play with blocks and toys to learn the fundamental
concepts of space; by contrast, by singing and clapping, they play with music to learn about time. </p>
<p>There is something profound about the way in which music can accelerate, retard, bend and colour our sense of time’s passing. We can sit in a concert hall or opera theatre for an hour and hear 90 different people make thousands of noises on bits of wood, metal and flesh, and yet walk away with the impression we have heard one thing - a symphony, or an opera. </p>
<p>Music joins up time, and allows us to hear time as patterned and organised. These patterns allow us to predict the future - we listen in anticipation: that a melody will come to rest, or a harmony will move in ways that make sense to us, wordlessly. </p>
<p>Music is also a powerful stimulus of memory - overhearing a piece of remembered music can instantly rekindle long-forgotten memories. </p>
<p>It is much easier for most of us to memorise a song (words and all) than it is to memorise a poem. Music is a tool for grasping the order and sense between what has happened in the past, what is happening now, and what will happen in the future.</p>
<p>And to me, that sounds suspiciously like a definition of physics.</p>
<h2>Threat and survival</h2>
<p>Sadly, there is one last way in which music
and physics are currently bedfellows. Worldwide, both disciplines are under threat at universities. In <a href="http://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/201101/edcorner.cfm" target="_blank">America</a> and the <a href="http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/2006/oct/03/uk-physics-department-faces-closure" target="_blank">UK</a>, several physics departments have closed or are in danger.</p>
<p>Music education no longer receives government funding at UK universities, and in Australia <a href="https://theconversation.com/anu-music-school-cuts-musicians-need-to-keep-in-time-7731">recent controversies</a> at ANU and Edith Cowan are symptomatic of the fact government funding for music is problematic. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/13015/original/rccph7xm-1342413937.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/13015/original/rccph7xm-1342413937.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=788&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13015/original/rccph7xm-1342413937.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=788&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13015/original/rccph7xm-1342413937.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=788&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13015/original/rccph7xm-1342413937.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=990&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13015/original/rccph7xm-1342413937.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=990&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/13015/original/rccph7xm-1342413937.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=990&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">pfly</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>And the provision and quality of music and physics education in our secondary schools, crucial to support and enable undergraduate study, are always competing with the demands for more and more literacy and numeracy in the curriculum.</p>
<p>There is not yet a crisis - at least, not at the high end: it remains, at least for the moment, sexy enough in policy terms to fund the elite practitioners. </p>
<p>The select few physics virtuosi who will discover whatever comes after the <a href="https://theconversation.com/cern-discovers-a-higgs-like-particle-let-the-party-and-head-scratching-begin-8036">Higgs boson</a>, or their musical equivalents who will perform the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OP9SX7V14Z4">Queen of the Night</a> aria at the Sydney Opera house or Covent Garden, still capture both the public imagination and the public purse. </p>
<p>But the opportunities for students to study fundamental and abstract ideas - such as music and physics - as part of a liberal arts education that supports a civilised and educated society are becoming fewer and fewer. </p>
<p>John Rayner was right to call the relationship between music and physics a love song. Let us just hope it’s not also a swansong.
<br>
<strong>Further reading:</strong>
<a href="https://theconversation.com/this-is-a-love-song-the-physics-of-music-and-the-music-of-physics-7799">This is a love song: the physics of music and the music of physics</a></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/8188/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jonathan Powles does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>My ANU colleague John Rayner’s excellent recent article on the physics of music seemed to touch a nerve with the readership of The Conversation. Although beautifully framed by the personal and anecdotal…Jonathan Powles, Associate Professor and Director, Academic Skills at the University of Canberra, University of CanberraLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/77992012-07-10T20:17:10Z2012-07-10T20:17:10ZThis is a love song: the physics of music and the music of physics<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12764/original/ptx42r8n-1341894709.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Music is the language of love – and it exemplifies some principles of science.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source"> Roxanne Milward</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>My wife Theresa represents many things for me – in addition to being my partner, I see her as a 17cm-long <a href="http://brinesacoustics.com/Pages/Nature.html">quarter-wavelength resonator</a> (which I hope you’ll understand and agree with by the end of this article). Romance, as you’ll have noted by this stage, is most definitely not dead. Theresa is also a noted operatic soprano. In the one person she combines the artistry, feeling and lyrical tones of her craft with some beautiful physics. </p>
<p>For me, physics has an aesthetic beauty of its own, expressed through a small number of universal principles that sweep across a range of apparently unconnected applications. From Theresa, let’s take the principle of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resonance">resonance</a> which is where we can make large vibrations if we push something at a rate that is the same as its natural frequency.</p>
<p>Imagine you want to push a child’s swing. The swing has a <a href="http://www.cs.wright.edu/%7Ejslater/SDTCOutreachWebsite/nat_frequency.htm">natural frequency</a> or rate of vibration at which it swings. If you push the swing at a rate much faster than its natural frequency not much happens; the same goes if you push at a very slow rate. But, if you push it at a rate that is the same as its natural frequency, then with very little effort you produce very large oscillations. We have resonance. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/I4FPK1oKddQ?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>The general physics principle is that you have resonance whenever an external source vibrates a system at its natural frequency.</p>
<p>You can certainly break a wine-glass using sound, as the video below aptly demonstrates. What matters is not so much the volume of the sound but the precise matching of the sound to the natural frequency of the wine-glass to give resonance. A glass of wine has a natural frequency of 791 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hz">Hz</a>. </p>
<p>If the sound from a loudspeaker is 790 Hz or 792 Hz then nothing happens, but 791 Hz produces violent vibrations.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/17tqXgvCN0E?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Other areas where we find resonance include: radio tuners, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MRI">MRI</a> (Magnetic Resonance Imaging), bridge dynamics, road corrugations, and virtually all musical instruments. </p>
<p>This is what I mean by the economical beauty of physics: the same principle is enacted again and again.</p>
<p>The natural frequency of an instrument such as a guitar depends on what are called “<a href="http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/jw/strings.html">standing waves</a>”. The video below illustrates the basics. </p>
<p>Imagine you are standing on a seawall watching the waves roll in, hitting the wall and reflecting back out to sea again. If a reflected wave meets the next incoming wave then the two waves run in to each other, producing a spectacular pile-up of water - we have a standing wave. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ic73oZoqr70?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>The idea of a standing wave is another unifying principle in physics found not only with water waves but also in meteorology, lasers, antennas, <a href="https://theconversation.com/explainer-quantum-physics-570">quantum mechanics</a> and musical instruments, whether they be strings, woodwinds, brass or percussion.</p>
<p>The standing wave for a vibrating guitar string has no vibration at its ends and maximum vibration at its middle, and so is half a wavelength long. </p>
<p>One complete <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wavelength">wavelength</a> goes from a point of no vibration (a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Node_(physics)">node</a> to a maximum vibration in one direction, through a second node to a maximum vibration in the opposite direction and back to a node; after that the pattern repeats. The frequency of the string depends on the wavelength. </p>
<p>A short string has a short wavelength and a high frequency. A long string has a long wavelength and a low frequency. The same idea applies to columns of air, such as organ pipes. </p>
<p>A very long pipe has a long wavelength set by the length of the pipe and a very low frequency, while the opposite happens for very short pipes. The pipes resonate at a frequency set by their length.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12209/original/4r7zkzdw-1340685365.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12209/original/4r7zkzdw-1340685365.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12209/original/4r7zkzdw-1340685365.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12209/original/4r7zkzdw-1340685365.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12209/original/4r7zkzdw-1340685365.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12209/original/4r7zkzdw-1340685365.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12209/original/4r7zkzdw-1340685365.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12209/original/4r7zkzdw-1340685365.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Rubens tube.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">John Rayner</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The picture above shows what’s known as a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubens'_tube">Rubens tube</a> – a physics apparatus for demonstrating standing waves. I used the one you can see in a recent <a href="http://billboard.anu.edu.au/event_view.asp?id=91371">public lecture</a> because it gives a beautiful demonstration of standing waves. </p>
<p>I made my tube from drainpipe with one end blocked off and a loudspeaker mounted in the other end. I drilled small holes in the top and coupled the tube to a gas bottle. The speaker launched sound waves down the tube that reflected from the far end making a standing wave pattern with alternating regions of high and low pressure as is clearly shown by the height of the flames. </p>
<p>Changing the frequency produced different resonances in the tube. Playing <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eF5pEsJQlxI">Scotland the Brave</a> on the bagpipes through the speaker produces remarkable dancing flames.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/PV2RYvC_nuU?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Now let’s come back to my wife, Theresa (see the video above). If you have a pipe that is open at one end and closed at the other you have a maximum at the open end and a node at the closed end. This corresponds to a quarter of a wavelength. </p>
<p>When Theresa sings she opens her throat by raising her <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soft_palate">soft palate</a> and lowering her <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larynx">larynx</a>. She calls it the “yawning” position because a full yawn naturally opens your throat. The effect is to produce a lovely open column of air nearly closed at her vocal folds (a node) and open at her mouth. </p>
<p>She has produced a quarter-wavelength long resonant pipe. Using a tape measure I find that the distance from her open mouth to her vocal folds is about 17cm. I wasn’t just sweet-talking her before: she really is a 17cm-long quarter-wavelength resonator! </p>
<p>It is the power in this resonance - the singer’s “<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formant">formant</a>” - that allows her to soar above a full orchestra. </p>
<p>As I sit in an audience captured by the beauty of her voice I still marvel at the physics behind it all.
<br>
<strong>Further reading:</strong> <a href="https://theconversation.com/music-and-physics-the-connections-arent-trivial-8188">Music and physics – the connections aren’t trivial</a></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/7799/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John Rayner does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>My wife Theresa represents many things for me – in addition to being my partner, I see her as a 17cm-long quarter-wavelength resonator (which I hope you’ll understand and agree with by the end of this…John Rayner, Visiting Fellow in Science Communication , Australian National UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/76102012-07-05T03:49:52Z2012-07-05T03:49:52ZA Hard Day’s Night by numbers: The Beatles decoded<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12276/original/3t9zh3sc-1340776124.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=1%2C42%2C1022%2C676&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Roll up for the mathematical mystery tour.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Lucy (嘉莉)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>“TWANG! It’s been a …” </p>
<p>There is perhaps no song as quintessentially Beatle-ish as A Hard Day’s Night - it just bubbles with unbridled enthusiasm and joy. And in my mind, there’s no other opening chord of a rock song that is as instantly recognisable as that one. </p>
<p>I grew up grudgingly playing the piano, practising only the half-hour before my lesson each week. But as soon as heard my first Beatles’ record, I dropped the piano to teach myself guitar eight hours a day during my high school summers. </p>
<p>Something about the early Beatles’ music struck a chord, so to speak, deep down inside of me, and it hasn’t left.</p>
<p>At about the same time, my love for mathematics blossomed, and I played in a band while attending my undergraduate studies. It was a tough choice, but I gave up music for the safer gig, as a mathematician. But unbeknown to me, the music that lay dormant inside me would serendipitously mix with the math inside me.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/zSm0M-BbVdY?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>In 2004 I heard it was the 40th anniversary of the Beatles’ [first movie](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Hard_Day’s_Night_(film) – A Hard Day’s Night – and the soundtrack of the same name. All of the media attention brought to mind that famous opening chord that opened the movie and title song. </p>
<p>While teaching myself guitar years earlier, I had invested in a lot of Beatles songbooks, only to find that every book had a different transcription for how the author thought <a href="http://www.georgeharrison.com/#/">George Harrison</a> had coaxed that initial sound out of his brand new twelve-string <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rickenbacker">Rickenbacker</a> guitar. All were derived by some combination of listening and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_theory">music theory</a>, but to me none sounded quite right.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12263/original/rtbnps6d-1340772604.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12263/original/rtbnps6d-1340772604.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12263/original/rtbnps6d-1340772604.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12263/original/rtbnps6d-1340772604.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12263/original/rtbnps6d-1340772604.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12263/original/rtbnps6d-1340772604.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12263/original/rtbnps6d-1340772604.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">1999 Rickenbacker guitar with the distinctive R-tailpiece.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mr.Fingers</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>My mathematical outlook had me take a different approach in 2004 – was there a scientific way to decide how the chord was played? Indeed, I had read a math book for leisure (yes we mathematicians do that sort of thing!) about ten years earlier that described the mathematics of sound and music.</p>
<p>In particular, there was a process, called a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourier_transform">Fourier transform</a>, that could allow one to decompose a sound wave into its constitute pure tones (which were modelled by <a href="http://jwilson.coe.uga.edu/EMAT6680/Dunbar/Assignment1/sine_curves_KD.html">sine</a> and <a href="http://www.wku.edu/%7Etom.richmond/Cosine.html">cosine curves</a>). I had also remembered that there were algorithms to do just that, so I embarked on some CSI-like musical forensics. I took a small part of the opening chord and ran it through a Fourier transform, and held my breath waiting for the output.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12426/original/cmdjm5pj-1340981947.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12426/original/cmdjm5pj-1340981947.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12426/original/cmdjm5pj-1340981947.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=370&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12426/original/cmdjm5pj-1340981947.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=370&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12426/original/cmdjm5pj-1340981947.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=370&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12426/original/cmdjm5pj-1340981947.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12426/original/cmdjm5pj-1340981947.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12426/original/cmdjm5pj-1340981947.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The spectrum of the 48 frequencies of largest amplitude from “The Chord”.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jason Brown</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It was a bit daunting – there were thousands of frequencies in the opening chord. But all was not lost, as I could tell the amplitudes of the frequencies, and the amplitude corresponds roughly with the loudness. So I began to make mathematical deductions from the data, and I quickly came upon some interesting conclusions. </p>
<p>First, all of the transcriptions I had seen for the guitar chord were incorrect – they had a <a href="http://www.gotaukulele.com/2011/02/ukulele-beginners-what-is-low-g.html">low G note</a> present, and the mathematics clearly indicated that the frequency simply wasn’t present. </p>
<p>Musicians thought they had heard the note, and as the [key](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Key_(music) of the song was G, they believed it to be there all the more strongly. But it wasn’t.</p>
<p>Furthermore, I could see that the frequencies often were not particularly close to notes, so that it would have behoved the Beatles’ producer, <a href="http://www.beatlesbible.com/people/george-martin/">George Martin</a>, to have knocked on the studio window before the final take of the song and said: “Better tune up again, boys.” The Beatles’ guitars were gloriously slightly out-of-tune, adding to the difficulty in reproducing the chord.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12278/original/xs4rjst8-1340776544.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12278/original/xs4rjst8-1340776544.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12278/original/xs4rjst8-1340776544.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12278/original/xs4rjst8-1340776544.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12278/original/xs4rjst8-1340776544.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12278/original/xs4rjst8-1340776544.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12278/original/xs4rjst8-1340776544.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Beatles with producer George Martin in the studio at Abbey Road.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Capitol Records</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A much bigger problem loomed. There were three frequencies corresponding to a certain “F” note, with no corresponding note up the octave, and this meant that note couldn’t have been played on George Harrison’s twelve string, and further, there was no way for the Beatles’ guitars to cover the frequencies. The answer involved throwing out the assumption that only the Beatles played on the opening chord. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12277/original/xsfzhv8n-1340776338.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12277/original/xsfzhv8n-1340776338.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=1424&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12277/original/xsfzhv8n-1340776338.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=1424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12277/original/xsfzhv8n-1340776338.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=1424&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12277/original/xsfzhv8n-1340776338.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1789&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12277/original/xsfzhv8n-1340776338.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1789&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12277/original/xsfzhv8n-1340776338.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1789&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The correct chords to play discovered via the Fourier transform.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jason Brown</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A solution lay with insertion of a piano into the mix, as pianos have, toward the top end of the keyboard, three identically tuned strings under each note. Upon this realisation, the remainder of the chord began to unravel fairly quickly, and I could deduce what instruments (guitars, bass and piano) played what notes. A little bit of math went a long way!</p>
<p>The greatest difficulty I encountered after the research was finding a public forum to publish the work. It was going to appear in a <a href="http://www.jasonibrown.com/pdfs/n-oct04-harddayjib.pdf">peer-reviewed journal</a>, but I thought the story was interesting enough for everyone to read. One magazine refused to read it based on the fact that the article had mathematics in it! But <a href="http://www.guitarplayer.com/">Guitar Player</a> magazine loved the work, and was happy to publish the <a href="http://www.guitarplayer.com/article/mathematics-johns-left/mar-09/92751">article</a>, and the rest is, as they say, history.</p>
<p>Over the ensuing years, I have applied mathematics in a variety of ways to analyse pop music. In a <a href="http://jasonibrown.com/images/gp-ahdn2.JPG">second article</a> in Guitar Player magazine I deduced mathematically that George Harrison must have recorded his famous, brilliant solo in A Hard Day’s Night by slowing down the tape speed in half, and recording the solo at half-speed down the octave. </p>
<p>Some musicians I’ve spoken with have been upset at the research, as perhaps it showed George’s technical skills were not what they should have been, but the truth I think says more – it showed George was a musician first, doing what it took to play what was in his head rather than in his fingers, and he had to have an incredible amount of confidence to choose to record a solo at half-speed, knowing that all of the world would be watching for when he played it up to speed, live (which, of course, he did!).</p>
<p>I’ve also <a href="http://jasonibrown.com/images/Riffs-March09.jpg">written</a> about why the music to I Want To Hold Your Hand was so imaginative and clever that it brought America to its knees, and why Paul McCartney so correctly named Little Richard’s Long Tall Sally as perhaps one of the greatest rock songs ever (and more generally, <a href="http://www.jasonibrown.com/pdfs/Notesv41n4.pdf">a mathematical basis for why the blues chord progression is so damn good</a>). </p>
<p>Finally, in recent work with Robert Dawson of St. Marys University, <a href="http://www.jasonibrown.com/pdfs/Notesv43n1-2.pdf">we explained mathematically</a> why George Martin’s famous edit in Strawberry Fields Forever never quite satisfied Paul (and never could).</p>
<figure>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/j28Lj5t_7Xo?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
</figure>
<p>Moreover, the research continues to open doors for me, especially as an ambassador for mathematics. I’ve written a book for the general public called <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Our-Days-Are-Numbered-Mathematics/dp/0771016972">Our Days Are Numbered: How Mathematics Orders Our Lives</a> and published my first CD, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Songs-In-Key-Pi/dp/B003HB5LG2">Songs in the Key of Pi</a>, of my own songs. </p>
<p>In fact, the <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123325321424929493.html">Wall Street Journal</a> came a-knocking back in 2008, and shot a video of a <a href="http://live.wsj.com/video/math-professor-jason-browns-a-million-whys/86E3D76F-17C6-404C-8B2C-A5AF139026DC.html">song</a> I wrote in the style of the early Beatles, using mathematical principles I gleaned from their music. </p>
<p>And I continue to travel worldwide, giving <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NCBDU8UvbY">public lectures</a> on mathematics and music, most often with a guitar slung over my shoulder and with a rockin’ band behind me. The Beatles, it seems, gave me a great ticket to ride!</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/7610/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jason Brown receives funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research of Canada. He is affiliated with Dalhousie University in Halifax, Canada.</span></em></p>“TWANG! It’s been a …” There is perhaps no song as quintessentially Beatle-ish as A Hard Day’s Night - it just bubbles with unbridled enthusiasm and joy. And in my mind, there’s no other opening chord…Jason Brown, Professor of Mathematics and Statistics and Faculty of Computer Science, Dalhousie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/77502012-06-26T20:36:38Z2012-06-26T20:36:38ZBeast international: does rock music rouse the animal within?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12211/original/tkpdnwb9-1340686931.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=5%2C214%2C1830%2C1157&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Nice sounds – but are you responding to the bass or your basal ganglia?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">TORIMBC</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>There’s no doubt rock music evokes excitement, but is there more to that excitement than guitar solos and head banging?</p>
<p>Writing in the <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/9327104/Why-rock-music-brings-out-the-animal-in-us.html">Telegraph</a> recently, science correspondent Nick Collins remarked:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Rock music … excites us because it recreates the sound of primal distress calls and ‘brings out the animal in us’ scientists claim.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Collins was discussing a paper called <a href="http://rsbl.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/early/2012/06/07/rsbl.2012.0374.full.pdf">The Sound of Arousal in Music is Context-dependent</a>, by David Blumstein, Greg Bryant and Peter Kaye, published earlier this month in Biology Letters.</p>
<p>Interestingly, the paper contains no reference to rock music – nowhere is there a statement about “the animal in us”. Instead, these broader links were made by one of the authors, <a href="http://gabryant.bol.ucla.edu/">Greg Bryant</a> of the UCLA Center for Behaviour, Evolution and Culture in Los Angeles, when he was interviewed for the Telegraph piece:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“This study helps explain why the distortion of rock-and-roll gets people excited”. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>I would have thought exciting for some people – but not necessarily all? </p>
<p>And what does the phrase “brings out the animal in us” even mean? Humans <em>are</em> animals after all, so what types of behaviour are alluded to here? Are these the evil, antisocial behaviours that 1950s America thought were stimulated by listening to Elvis, music that Ed Sullivan once said was “<a href="http://cine-fille.com/2012/02/22/the-elvis-files-love-me-tender/">unfit for family viewing</a>?”</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/sGZm7EOamWk?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Elvis Presley performing “Hound Dog” on The Ed Sullivan Show, October 28, 1956.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>You should be dancing</h2>
<p>Dancing is a universal human attribute. Rhythmic movements of body and limbs in response to music are also a typical human trait, almost certainly driven by <a href="http://www.fz-juelich.de/inm/inm-2/EN/Research/NeuronalCircuitries/_node.html">neuronal circuitries</a> that involve the complex <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basal_ganglia">basal ganglia</a> motor system. </p>
<p>There’s no doubt rock music can be highly stimulating and emotionally energising, but so can other forms of music that entrain physiological arousal states. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12215/original/229dccqq-1340687630.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12215/original/229dccqq-1340687630.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12215/original/229dccqq-1340687630.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12215/original/229dccqq-1340687630.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12215/original/229dccqq-1340687630.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12215/original/229dccqq-1340687630.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12215/original/229dccqq-1340687630.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12215/original/229dccqq-1340687630.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jesse Draper</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Music we enjoy, whatever its nature, activates neural centres typically linked with reward behaviours. Music we dislike drives other regions such as the <a href="http://www.sciencedaily.com/articles/a/amygdala.htm">amygdala</a>, a large grey-matter structure buried in the <a href="http://www.brainexplorer.org/brain_atlas/Brainatlas_Forebrain.shtml">forebrain</a> that has long been associated with a person’s mental state and subjective <a href="http://polorovereto.unitn.it/%7Ecolombetti/docs/GC_AppraisingValence05.pdf">responses to emotion</a> (valence), often with events that elicit negative affective states.</p>
<p>Strong responses to music are not merely the domain of rock. American novelist and journalist <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Mailer">Norman Mailer</a> described <a href="http://books.google.com.au/books?id=JV6PuXJu9aAC&pg=PA34&lpg=PA34&dq=Norman+Mailer+described+jazz+as+orgasm&source=bl&ots=C9MyreovmY&sig=S2auyZmvAsIEI8CNxjDPeKx-WaQ&hl=en&sa=X&ei=4WDiT4CGCqv5mAWvqdD4Aw&ved=0CGoQ6AEwCA#v=onepage&q=Norman%20Mailer%20described%20jazz%20as%20orgasm&f=false">jazz as orgasm</a>, German composer <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Wagner">Richard Wagner</a> was variously described as a “<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Lexicon-Musical-Invective-Composers-Beethovens/sim/039332009X/2">demented eunuch</a>”, and a “<a href="http://books.google.com.au/books?id=0XoD4afVcVIC&pg=PA105&lpg=PA105&dq=wagner+a+tonal+antichrist&source=bl&ots=10wT1sj8K2&sig=-QlAuZCtzIOlw8WE1cUY1Nl5Zb4&hl=en&sa=X&ei=OD_pT476IuGJmQWuh4GUDg&ved=0CE8Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=wagner%20a%20tonal%20antichrist&f=false">tonal antichrist</a>”, and the great conductor <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Beecham">Sir Thomas Beecham</a> is quoted <a href="http://www.norpete.com/b0136.html">to have said</a>: “I’ve not heard any Stockhausen, but I think I’ve trodden in some.”</p>
<h2>Your brain on music</h2>
<p>The paper in Biology Letters compared subjects’ responses to neutral music and the same music that was interrupted by noise or abrupt frequency shifts. The authors suggested that these harsh sounds are akin to danger signals, harsh vocalisations signalling danger and fearful arousal in the listener. </p>
<p>The researchers also make the interesting recommendation that ecologically based acoustic phenomena, presumably sounds that resemble what is generated in nature, be it animate or inanimate, should be used in music cognition studies in addition to “traditionally studied dimensions such as melody, timbre, and rhythm”. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/11984/original/gzk7hjd4-1340240393.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/11984/original/gzk7hjd4-1340240393.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/11984/original/gzk7hjd4-1340240393.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/11984/original/gzk7hjd4-1340240393.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/11984/original/gzk7hjd4-1340240393.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/11984/original/gzk7hjd4-1340240393.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/11984/original/gzk7hjd4-1340240393.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/11984/original/gzk7hjd4-1340240393.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The different areas of the brain relevant to music processing.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">SeTH HAYDEN</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Fair enough, although I find the link between the computer-generated non-linearities (random distortions and sudden changes in frequency) and animal calls a little tenuous. And surely arousal states are not necessarily fearful states, or indications of danger, as seems to be assumed by Blumstein and colleagues? </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12214/original/62p2d8fc-1340687502.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12214/original/62p2d8fc-1340687502.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=854&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12214/original/62p2d8fc-1340687502.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=854&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12214/original/62p2d8fc-1340687502.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=854&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12214/original/62p2d8fc-1340687502.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1073&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12214/original/62p2d8fc-1340687502.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1073&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12214/original/62p2d8fc-1340687502.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1073&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">marcia.furman</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The other interesting aspect of the paper, not discussed at all by Nick Collins in the Telegraph, was what I would consider a major focus of the study: how responses to unpredictable nonlinear sounds were modified when subjects also viewed videos showing “benign activities,” such as people drinking coffee or reading a book.</p>
<p>There was reduced arousal but valence judgements were less affected, leading the authors to conclude that “perceptual context influences <a href="http://www.kyb.tuebingen.mpg.de/research/rg/ernstgroup/multimodal-perception.html">multi-modal perception</a>”.</p>
<p>It is perhaps to be expected that consistency in signals received via different types of sensory input is important in how we interpret information. Thus the amygdala and other brain regions <a href="http://archneur.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=580070">are especially active</a> when both facial expression and the emotional content of speech signify happiness.</p>
<p>Or to <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S67CTVVv3KQ&feature=related">put it another way</a>: “You can’t hide your lyin’ eyes and your smile is a thin disguise. I thought by now you’d realize there ain’t no way to hide your lyin’ eyes”. </p>
<p>It would be of interest to know if the same random distortion noise and sudden frequency shifts used in the Blumstein study elicit similar responses even in the absence of an underlying musical substrate. Would the sounds alone be sufficient?</p>
<h2>What makes music?</h2>
<p>What defines music anyway? Are the screeching violins that accompany the famous <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KF_6gI0xHzw">shower scene in Psycho</a> music? Or are they just random sounds that might as well be generated by dragging a finger nail across a blackboard?</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12216/original/sjbv2hdc-1340687804.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12216/original/sjbv2hdc-1340687804.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/12216/original/sjbv2hdc-1340687804.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=806&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12216/original/sjbv2hdc-1340687804.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=806&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12216/original/sjbv2hdc-1340687804.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=806&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12216/original/sjbv2hdc-1340687804.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1013&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12216/original/sjbv2hdc-1340687804.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1013&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/12216/original/sjbv2hdc-1340687804.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1013&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Universal Studios</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In fact, the fascinating interactions between music and visual images have been the subject of a number of studies. Associating emotion-laden music with concurrent visual stimuli (“real world” content) <a href="http://www.cell.com/trends/cognitive-sciences/abstract/S1364-66131000003-3">has been reported</a> to have an additive effect and increase responses in certain parts of the brain, and co-presentation of sad or scary music together with pictures depicting similar emotions produces in the amygdala and elsewhere the greatest emotional brain responses. </p>
<p>As <a href="http://books.google.com.au/books?id=jqb6WrXS68kC&pg=PA122&lpg=PA122&dq=audiences+worldwide+find+it+natural+and+fitting+that+movies+have+musical+scores+to+underline+or+interpret+the+emotions+implicit+in+the+story;+even+the+earliest+silent+films+were+given+musical+accompaniment&source=bl&ots=Of4AlqNRWB&sig=wWOfMBqJvnG1VJHihw0iA5PVh0U&hl=en&sa=X&ei=8D_pT-mbCeeDmQWHl72YDg&ved=0CE4Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=audiences%20worldwide%20find%20it%20natural%20and%20fitting%20that%20movies%20have%20musical%20scores%20to%20underline%20or%20interpret%20the%20emotions%20implicit%20in%20the%20story%3B%20even%20the%20earliest%20silent%20films%20were%20given%20musical%20accompaniment&f=false">pointed out</a> by the late philosopher <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denis_Dutton">Denis Dutton</a>: “audiences worldwide find it natural and fitting that movies have musical scores to underline or interpret the emotions implicit in the story; even the earliest silent films were given musical accompaniment” and the nature of the background music affects how we remember visual events. </p>
<p>So does rock music recreate the sound of primal distress calls and bring out the animal in us? Well, it is certainly stimulating, energising, sometimes wonderful, sometimes horribly distracting. </p>
<p>But music is a human universal, a communication stream that is, in my view, unique to us. </p>
<p>So if anything the headline of this piece, and any other like it, should be asking not about animals but rather: does rock music rouse the human within?</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/7750/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alan Harvey receives funding from NHMRC and ARC</span></em></p>There’s no doubt rock music evokes excitement, but is there more to that excitement than guitar solos and head banging? Writing in the Telegraph recently, science correspondent Nick Collins remarked: “Rock…Alan Harvey, Winthrop Professor of Anatomy, Physiology and Human Biology, The University of Western AustraliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/77462012-06-21T20:08:03Z2012-06-21T20:08:03ZDarwinTunes: when you get that feeling it’s, uh, sexual hearing?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/11945/original/dfy2c76w-1340169795.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C47%2C1022%2C581&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Feel free to bust out some tunes, but you won't fool the children of the evolution.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Verano y mil tormentas</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>What transforms noise from album filler to dancefloor killer? Why do some tracks turn us on while others make us tune out?</p>
<p><a href="http://darwintunes.org/">DarwinTunes</a>, a computer program that employs the principles of <a href="https://theconversation.com/explainer-theory-of-evolution-2276">natural selection</a> and sexual reproduction (see below), aims to show how music evolves from noise to aesthetically pleasing music. </p>
<p>The authors of the related paper, <a href="http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2012/06/12/1203182109">Evolution of Music by Public Choice</a>, are to be congratulated on developing a model that convincingly “shed(s) light on the evolution of real musical cultures”. </p>
<p>Such an approach adds to the growing stock of material that addresses <a href="https://theconversation.com/evolution-please-dont-stop-the-music-317">music as an evolved phenomenon</a>: both in terms of its origination as a human characteristic; and as a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meme">memetic</a> system – that is, a cultural practice of social behaviour passed on through generations, such as fashion. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="100%" height="450" scrolling="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fapi.soundcloud.com%2Fplaylists%2F72772&auto_play=false&show_artwork=false&color=F5F0FF" frameborder="0"></iframe>
</figure>
<p>But there are problems. The design of DarwinTunes mimics <a href="http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/evolutionary-genetics/">genetic evolution</a>. But music is quintessentially memetic, and apt to fluctuate, where biological evolution cannot as easily put itself, as it were, into reverse; and do so at accelerated rates.</p>
<h2>Know your meme</h2>
<p>Within the meme “hairstyle”, a population can switch from mullet to Mohican and back at runaway/runway speed. Hairstyling suggests a key property of the interface of biological and cultural evolution that has not been captured by DarwinTunes.</p>
<p>The model the authors have devised adopts a largely <a href="https://theconversation.com/artificial-selection-on-music-and-on-rappers-7781">sexual selection premise</a>, based on the <a href="http://www.cs.cmu.edu/%7Edst/Tutorials/Info-Theory/">information theory</a> approach of broadcast-receive, modelled as produce-consume. </p>
<p>A significant role in the evolution of human music, at least where its origins as instinctive vocalisation with ritual connotations are concerned, is argued by authors such as <a href="http://cmv.customer.netspace.net.au/MusicResearch.html">Bjorn Merker, Bruce Richman, Robin Dunbar and Iain Morley</a>. This relates to the capacity for simultaneous chorusing, whereby arousal and emotional empathy are recruited through performance in which pitch and rhythm are identically entrained. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/11932/original/6dmpx7fq-1340159026.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/11932/original/6dmpx7fq-1340159026.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/11932/original/6dmpx7fq-1340159026.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/11932/original/6dmpx7fq-1340159026.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/11932/original/6dmpx7fq-1340159026.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/11932/original/6dmpx7fq-1340159026.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/11932/original/6dmpx7fq-1340159026.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Dipanker Dutta</span></span>
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<p>This is seen as universal in human societies, and forms a significant means for the learning, teaching and sharing of song, affecting both the <a href="https://theconversation.com/imitation-and-imagination-childs-play-is-central-to-human-success-7555">preservation of the known</a> and the capacity for innovation. Such vocalisation was – and remains so in hunter-gatherer societies – rarely separated from dance.</p>
<h2>Darwin dancing</h2>
<p>To illustrate this point, let’s imagine a computer model that generates, in a manner similar to DarwinTunes, the transmission of choreography: let’s call it DarwinSteps. We would anticipate that some step patterns would be learnt through observation (produce-consume). A significant mover both in the means by which steps were perfected according to a model and as importantly, motivation applied to expend energy on the activity, would be simultaneous group performance.</p>
<p>As with our hairstyle example, the object is looking identical to other members of the community: what Merker has termed “<a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1196/annals.1360.003/full">conformal motive</a>”.</p>
<p>So, sounding identical, in unison performance, also has an observable function in the evolution of music in social settings.</p>
<p>Could this be captured in a model such as DarwinTunes? How would this be done? And what might it tell us in comparison with the current version?</p>
<h2>Play it again, Sam</h2>
<p>A checking procedure that mimicked the condition “repeat that identically” would double as a kind of approval, both in music and in dance. Of course, it could also propel what is planned as an evolutionary procedure into a closed loop in which the same pattern is reiterated ad infinitum – a bit like some modern dance music!</p>
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<p>Perhaps this is what produces “classics”? But even classics give rise to arrangements and cover versions.</p>
<p>It would nevertheless tell us more about the naturalistic transmission of musical material were a social selection element to be factored in: an algorithm for “performativity” and repetition by acclaim.</p>
<p>Two other factors come to mind: the receiver/consumer within the current model biases selection towards <a href="http://arxiv.org/pdf/1205.5651v1.pdf">Western Popular Music</a>; this is evident both in the rating by a web community and in the adoption of the feature detection programme <a href="http://isophonics.net/nnls-chroma">Chordino</a>, assumed to represent the biases of such listeners. </p>
<p>What would happen if the population responding to the material drew predominantly on other cultures? It would be a valuable test of DarwinTunes to expose it to this condition.</p>
<h2>Musical mutations</h2>
<p>A further thought comes to mind. Namely, the “progressivist” tendency whereby what counts as music is what is available in our current generation: equally tempered, with all instruments and voices able to carry material at all available pitch levels to which mutation might transpose them. But this is a decidedly post-modern condition for music to find itself in. </p>
<p>Brass instruments in the Classical period were <a href="http://www.d.umn.edu/%7Erperraul/MU5204-EnsembleLit/KJimenez.pdf.pdf">limited</a> principally to the notes of the [Harmonic Series](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harmonic_series_(music) so random mutation of music they “played” would have to take this into account lest listeners recognise “impossible” examples. </p>
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<p>In turn, the quality of the sounds humans encounter relates strongly to the environment and technology available to them.</p>
<p>Some cultures have resonant metal instruments, others do not. Some have access to gourds and bamboo from which rudimentary wind instruments of great expressivity can be made, as explored by <a href="http://users.iafrica.com/m/mu/musicman/">Pedro Espi-Sanchis</a>. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inuit">Inuit</a> are limited to duet singing (see video above), which they achieve with great ingenuity but in a manner that DarwinTunes as currently configured would be unable to compute. </p>
<p>All these ideas arise in response to this fascinating project. What they illustrate is that speculation on the origins of the human capacity for music – perhaps the holy grail of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_musicology">evolutionary musicology</a> – needs to take into account social and environmental factors responsible for what can be performed. Perhaps this is beyond the grasp of a model that begins with the synthesis of heard results.
<br>
<strong>Further reading:</strong> <br>
<a href="https://theconversation.com/artificial-selection-on-music-and-on-rappers-7781">Artificial selection on music and on rappers</a> – Rob Brooks</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/7746/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nicholas Bannan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>What transforms noise from album filler to dancefloor killer? Why do some tracks turn us on while others make us tune out? DarwinTunes, a computer program that employs the principles of natural selection…Nicholas Bannan, Professor in Music Education, The University of Western AustraliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/3172011-03-24T00:00:00Z2011-03-24T00:00:00ZEvolution: please don’t stop the music<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/64/original/Radio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Did music precede language for Homo sapiens?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Spuz/Flickr</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>All human cultures and social groups that we know of respond to music and dance. The type of music may vary but the underlying, fundamental principles of making music are the same. </p>
<p>Our recognition of, and emotional responses to, pleasant and unpleasant music seems to be universal, expressed even in very young infants and seemingly independent of our cultural upbringing. </p>
<p>So what exactly is music for? Why is it a universal that can profoundly affect people, why is it such an essential part of our lives? </p>
<p>Music is a form of communication which is different from language. In humans, music stimulates emotions and elicits autonomic and physiological responses. It entrains neural activity and is inextricably linked to movement and dance. </p>
<p>Music facilitates interactions within groups and can create common arousal states. It helps to provide cohesion and organisation to our social architecture. </p>
<p>Throughout recorded history, leaders - whether of nations, political parties or religious denominations - have understood the power of music to influence populations. </p>
<p>In recent times, researchers have shown that music structures time and provides mnemonic frameworks that aid learning and memory, help organise knowledge. Many of us can remember the lyrics of songs for example, but may not remember much, if any prose. </p>
<p>Attaching words to music somehow makes the words easier to memorise. Yet despite all of this, the impact of music remains mysterious: it does not seem to do anything, it does not transmit data and information in the same way as language/speech. </p>
<p>For many, the evolution of language in <em>Homo sapiens</em> is a unique event that is linked to the evolution of the cognitively modern mind. What then is the relationship between music and language, and to what extent are they dependent or independent of each other? </p>
<p>Our brains are known to be wired to process both forms of communication, but from an evolutionary point of view did music come before language, or vice versa, or was there a common precursor that somehow separated into two systems when <em>Homo sapiens</em> evolved, with both types of communication retained? </p>
<p>Was music an important element that contributed to the early well-being of our species? What, if any, advantages did music give to <em>Homo sapiens</em> from an evolutionary perspective as our founders migrated out of east Africa to colonise the planet? </p>
<p>Why does music continue to exist alongside language and remain important to all human cultures, thousands of generations after the founders of our species evolved? </p>
<p>Modern neuroscience research, especially using new imaging techniques such as positron emission tomography (PET) and functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) confirms that the processing of music has a consistent structural foundation in the human brain. </p>
<p>It has been known for some time that, in right-handed individuals, language is mostly processed in the left cerebral hemisphere while many aspects of music involve right hemisphere activity. </p>
<p>But new imaging data have revealed even more complex circuitries involved in music and language processing. Numerous regions of the brain are integrated into networks that subserve music or language processing and analysis, but the neuroimaging data also show that separation of these processing streams is by no means complete. </p>
<p>For example, there is overlap in brain areas that process the emotional (prosodic) aspects of music and speech, and studies have shown that musical training results in a shift towards processing in the left cerebral hemisphere.</p>
<p>As research continues, more is learned about how music-related circuits differ from, or overlap with, other pathways involved in cognitive and emotional processing. For example, brain areas associated with positive responses to music overlap with networks associated with reward behaviours, subjective experiences and acts of social cooperation. </p>
<p>In close association with the evolution of the modern mind, I believe music was of critical importance to our early ancestors; increased fitness and reproductive advantage of a group is gained not only by an individual’s success but also if cooperative behaviours benefit other members of the group, and importantly for our ancestors these benefits extended to others who were not necessarily genetically related. </p>
<p>For most people, music therapy remains a branch of “alternative” medicine, something outside the mainstream. But recent research suggests that it is time that this attitude was changed. </p>
<p>For example, training in music has measurable effects on brain plasticity and can influence learning ability during development. Music also seems to have mnemonic powers, activating circuits in the brain that are linked to aspects of memory processing. </p>
<p>There are also structural changes in developing brains associated with early musical training, and exposure to music seems to have beneficial effects on children suffering from developmental disorders such as autism and Williams syndrome. </p>
<p>In adults, many studies have shown that music used with physical therapy improves motor control and coordination, with benefits for rehabilitation after injury or in degenerative conditions such as Parkinson’s disease. </p>
<p>Music therapy may also improve memory recall and social awareness in Alzheimer’s patients and recent studies on stroke patients have shown that controlled exposure to music improves cognitive function, increases motivation and awareness, and enhances positive mood states. </p>
<p>Taken together, the evidence suggests that music remains just as essential to _Homo sapiens _now as it was 70,000-80,000 years ago. It continues to be important for development of our children, for our health and for our overall sense of mental well-being. </p>
<p>Above all, music is perhaps the primary medium which enables individual members of the species <em>Homo sapiens</em> to forget their mortal vulnerability and come together as a collective group to share and enjoy common physiological and emotional experiences.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/317/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alan Harvey receives funding from the NHMRC, ARC and WA Neurotrauma Research Program.</span></em></p>All human cultures and social groups that we know of respond to music and dance. The type of music may vary but the underlying, fundamental principles of making music are the same. Our recognition of…Alan Harvey, Winthrop Professor of Anatomy, Physiology and Human Biology, The University of Western AustraliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.