[CAUT] your brain on music

[Fred Sturm]

Hi all,
	I have been reading a book recently that has fascinated me: This is  
your Brain on Music, by Daniel Levitin. The author is a former rock  
music recording producer (etc) turned neuroscientist at McGill  
University (doctorate from Stanford, holds the "Bell Chair in the  
Psychology of of Electronic Communications at McGill). It's an attempt  
to cover both the neurological and psycho-neurological basis of music  
in the brain/mind, and present it in a manner accessible to the  
general public. Very interesting stuff. I recommend it.
	There are even things that pertain in a way to piano technology,  
especially tuning and listening to pitch (a lame attempt to make it  
"on topic" for the caut list <G>). Apparently there are individual  
neurons "hard-wired" to specific pitches - they fire in response to  
hearing a specific pitch (exactly how precise a pitch isn't stated,  
presumably the standard "note names" 100 cents apart). So there is a  
physiological basis for "perfect pitch."
	But much of the book is aimed at showing that music in its various  
aspects uses virtually every single corner of the brain.
Regards,
Fred Sturm
University of New Mexico
fssturm at unm.edu