This Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession - Hardcover

Levitin, Daniel J.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0525949690 ISBN 13: 9780525949695

Publisher: Dutton Adult, 2006

Synopsis

Whether you load your iPod with Bach or Bono, music has a significant role in your life—even if you never realized it. Why does music evoke such powerful moods? The answers are at last be- coming clear, thanks to revolutionary neuroscience and the emerging field of evolutionary psychology. Both a cutting-edge study and a tribute to the beauty of music itself, This Is Your Brain on Music unravels a host of mysteries that affect everything from pop culture to our understanding of human nature, including:
· Are our musical preferences shaped in utero?
· Is there a cutoff point for acquiring new tastes in music?
· What do PET scans and MRIs reveal about the brain’s response to music?
· Is musical pleasure different from other kinds of pleasure?

This Is Your Brain on Music explores cultures in which singing is considered an essential human function, patients who have a rare disorder that prevents them from making sense of music, and scientists studying why two people may not have the same definition of pitch. At every turn, this provocative work unlocks deep secrets about how nature and nurture forge a uniquely human obsession.

About this title

From the Back Cover:

"Endlessly stimulating, a marvelous overview, and one which only a deeply musical neuroscientist could give. Daniel Levitin has a huge knowledge of music developed since the 1950s (and of blues, jazz, and etc. before this), and not merely a formal but a deep personal knowledge as an expert performer no less than as a listener. I liked the discussion of 'safe' and 'dangerous' music, and I very much liked the final chapter on the evolutionary origins of music. An important book."
-Oliver Sacks, M.D.

About the Author:

Daniel J. Levitin runs the Levitin Laboratory for Musical Perception, Cognition, and Expertise at McGill University, where he holds the Bell Chair in the Psychology of Electronic Communications. Before becoming a neuroscientist, he was a record producer with gold records to his credit and professional musician. He has published extensively in scientific journals and music trade magazines such as Grammy and Billboard.

About this edition

• Publisher: Dutton Adult
• Publication date: 2006
• ISBN 10: 0525949690
• ISBN 13: 9780525949695
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 320