Music and the Brain

Music can be heard in all different kind of situations and places, but what defines music?  When you hear music in an advertisement, does it remind you of the product, make you want to buy it?  Why do certain types of music relate to human emotions?

I came across a group of podcasts from the Library of Congress called “Music and the Brain.”  Each topic was an interview with an expert in each specific field.  The one I found most interesting was, “Your Brain on Jazz: Neural Substrates of Spontaneous Improvisation.”  Interviewee Dr. Charles Lim, a neurosurgeon, spoke about how the brain works when listening and playing jazz.  In a segment of the interview, he talked about experiments they tried with jazz piano players and measuring their brain’s reaction using a functional MRI, which measures blood flow in the brain, which ultimately shows regions of the brain that become active or underactive.  They first measured which sections of the brain were more active when each pianist played written sheet music.  Then they compared those results to the results from each pianist improvising off the top of their head.  What they saw was a drastic change between areas of the brain that tap into the creative side of thought and self expression.

The other podcasts that were included were “The World in Six Songs: How the musical Brain Created Human Nature,” “The Music of Language and the Language of Music,” “Dangerous Music,” “From Mode to Emotion in Musical Communication,” and “Halt or I’ll Play Vivaldi! Classical Music as Crime Stopper.”

I found the rest of them equally interesting, especially examples of real life situations where some of the hypotheses’ were tested and proven true.

If you would like to listen to these podcasts, log in to the iTunes Store and search for “The Library of Congress: Music and the Brain.”  The best part of this, you can download them for free.  Definitely a worth while download if you have any interest in how music is perceived in the human mind.