Earth & Sky

This is your brain on music

Science has revealed that music activates the brain.

That’s according to cognitive neuroscientist Daniel Levitin of McGill University in Canada.

Daniel Levitin: One of the things we’ve learned using neuroimaging and scanning technology is that music activates almost every region of the brain that we’ve mapped.

Levitin said the inner ear and the brain take vibrations from the eardrum and translate that into a representation of sound.
He said different regions of the brain work simultaneously to extract information about musical sound, such as the pitch, rhythm, and tonal color. It’s then all put together in higher brain regions that give us a sense of a complete musical work.

Daniel Levitin: So listening to music involves attentional systems and memory, frontal lobe regions that try to figure out what’s going to happen next. Interestingly, when you’re listening to music, your motor cortex is often activated, especially if the music has a beat. Even if you’re not moving, your motor cortex seems to be making preparatory movements as though you were going to dance.

In addition to being a neuroscientist, Levitin is also a musician, and recording engineer who’s worked with Stevie Wonder, Eric Clapton and others.

His new book is called This is Your Brain on Music.

2 Comments for This is your brain on music

1. 1

   Oct 28, 12:09 AM #

   Dorise says:

   As a musucian, I do have a good memory.It seems that music really activates my brain.And I am so delighted that the above reserch has proven it.

2. 2

   Nov 13, 03:37 PM #

   Paul says:

   I can tell you as a musician the contentment I feel is not unlike the one I get from a good workout – although different more ethereal – just strumming a chord makes me go ahhhhhhhhhhh

   Paul
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