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

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There are questions that are too big for science; are there gods, for instance, or what is love? And maybe we will never fully find out scientifically why music does what it does and why we care about it so. But for many reasons, music ought to be a profitable subject for scientific enquiry. It is, as Pythagoras knew, an activity strongly rooted in mathematics, and the physics of music is fairly well understood. It is as universal as language; all human cultures have some sort of music, indicating it does something indispensable. And we are increasingly able to figure out, with our sophisticated brain imaging gadgets, what brains do when they hear or think about music. The neuroscience of music is the area of expertise of Daniel J. Levitin, and he writes of it in _This Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession_ (Dutton), a fascinating account of current music psychology. Levitin has produced a book wonderfully accessible to lay readers, since although he is an academic (he runs the Laboratory for Musical Perception, Cognition, and Expertise at McGill University), before he became a scientist, he had been a performing musician, sound engineer, and record producer, working with names like Steely Dan and Blue Oyster Cult. He does pull examples from Bach and Beethoven, but he is obviously more comfortable citing universally-known tunes like "Happy Birthday to You", "Somewhere Over the Rainbow", or "Stairway to Heaven". (Readers whose tastes range in previous epochs will possibly be surprised at the sophistication modern popular musicians have displayed.) Levitin has a good sense of humor and is a genial explainer.

He starts out with a forty page first chapter "What is Music?", which is as good a short explanation of key concepts as tone, scale, fifths, and timbre as anyone could want, and is a fine foundation for all that comes after, a collection of scientific lore and tidbits from all over. For instance, even if you are not a musician, you have a huge store of tunes in your memory. You may not have perfect pitch, the ability to know that an A flat is an A flat as soon as you hear it, but Levitin's own research has provided surprising evidence that your sense of pitch, even if you are not a musician, is really quite good. Subjects who were asked to sing a song from memory got the absolute pitch just right, or very close; they did the same with the song's tempo. There are differences in the brains of musicians and nonmusicians. The corpus callosum, the mass of fibers that connects the right brain hemisphere to the left, is larger in musicians, and is especially larger in those that started music training early. The overall lesson here, though, is that we are all musical, even if we are not musicians, and so non-expert musical brains are really very similar to expert ones. There are descriptions here of surprising research that makes clear how truly ready our brains are to incorporate musical experience. Fetuses in the last three months of gestation, for instance, can hear music within the womb, along with other outside and inside noises. Experiments have shown that if you repeatedly play a song into the womb, and then make sure the child does not hear it again after birth until it is one year old, and then play the music again, the infant will prefer hearing the womb-music rather than completely novel music. This was true whether the experimental music was Vivaldi or the Backstreet Boys.

Levitin certainly has connections; he tells of discussions with Francis Crick about themes in this book, as well as with Joni Mitchell. The final chapter, "The Music Instinct", is a response to cognitive scientist Steven Pinker, who spoke at a 1997 convention of researchers in music perception and cognition. Pinker took the dismissive stance that music was "auditory cheesecake", tickling the parts of the brain that were really for the important functions of language and (unlike language) useless as a force in human evolution. It is not surprising that Levitin and his fellow researchers disagree. Darwin himself felt that musical tones were used in conveying emotion and that those who were able to expend energy in singing or playing were demonstrating biological and sexual fitness. Musical success does make for high numbers of opportunities for spreading one's genes (just ask Mick Jagger). Interest in music peaks in adolescence, indicating a role in sexual selection. Music has been around longer than agriculture, and there is no evidence that language actually preceded music in our species. It may have promoted the cognitive development that was harnessed for speech. Only in the past few hundred years did music become a spectator activity, but in the eons when it could have shaped our social evolution, it was a group activity that may have promoted group togetherness and synchrony. It is an engaging final argument that serves to emphasize the importance of all that the book has presented before, a demonstration that looking at an important human activity in a scientific way only increases our wonder and delight in the activity itself.

The first thing is that this is a book expressing ideas about how the human mind processes music and how the brain is involved with that processing (not HOW the brain processes it, which no one knows), rather than a book on music. While I am not obsessed by the topic, I find the exploration of the mind and brain function fascinating. My interest was piqued when my father was taken by a brain tumor and I tried to find material on the subject. I read "Phantoms in the Brain" by V. S. Ramachandran and then some articles by others in the field who claimed the mind is simply an illusion created by brain function, that our sense of consciousness and choosing is simply false.

This has always seemed wrong to me, no matter how much of our brain function occurs without our "mind" or "consciousness" being involved in any way. Being a pianist, it has seemed to me that there is no biological necessity to play Chopin. And when I sit down at the piano, I choose what to play, how to play it, and whether to learn the piece in the first place. I was amused when I read articles by Pinker and others struggling in trying to come to terms with some evolutionary reason for music. Some simply dismiss it (I think because it is so inconvenient to their models), others try and find it a way to attract mates (as this author does), others find it an accidental use of some other evolutionarily advantageous trait even though they can't quite identify what it is or was.

So, I was glad to read this book because of my interest in the brain and mind along with my passion for music. It is indeed a very interesting book that I could not put down. Daniel Levitin is a scientist whose involves trying to understand how the mind perceives music and how that maps into the brain. It helps that he is also a musician. He worked in a commercial rock and roll band and as a record producer. Now, I am a classical musician and have a degree in music theory, so it is unsurprising that he and I view some aspects of music differently. In fact, I found some of his descriptions a bit sloppy and more simplistic than the simplification required in communicating to the general non-musician reading public. But then again, I know nothing about the technical terminology of brain function.

Just a few examples that stopped me cold. On page 31 Levitin asserts that the way we use sharps and flats is artificially complicated. He says, "there is no reason for the system to be so complicated, but it is what we are stuck with." Well, actually, there are several great reasons that have to do with the way our music system has evolved over the past eight centuries and more. There weren't keys or chords or even scales in the beginning. As soon as things would become settled in one generation a new generation would come along and stir things up because they wanted something a bit more this or a lot more that. So, the musical system adapted to accommodate the new music.

The idea of those keys and chords Levitin refers to as features of all music are really only a few hundred years old while the notions of modulation or "changing keys" is younger yet. And as he notes, non-Western music is organized more along "melodic" and "motivic" principles than our notions of functional harmony.

Some experimental music systems have been proposed over the past couple of hundred years and they have caught on about as well as Esperanto replaced English, French, or the hundreds and thousands of other natural languages and dialects. And for similar reasons. A complicated "natural" system, even with their inconvenient irregularities, will outlast a regular and tidy "artificial" system every time.

When he was discussing "keys" around page 36, he asserts that tonal prominence is given to the stated "key" through assertion by repetition. Actually, no. It is not a simple subject, but the tonal center of a major key is asserted by the combination of perfect fifths versus the one diminished fifth on the note a half step main keynote, plus the combination of major and minor thirds plus the combination of whole and half steps. When evaluated, there are a number of places in the scale that are ambiguous, but there are unique combinations that become pointers to the key center. And this is why the minor key, which the author asserts has purely cultural status (wrong), is used by composers to connote affects with more ambiguity.

C-major and a-minor (in its natural form) use exactly the same notes. When you play a-minor in its natural form you will eventually want to get to C-major (and that is why most classical piece in the minor mode modulate first to the relative major key rather than the dominant as is done in major keys). In order to make a-minor sound like a tonal center the harmonic form has a "raised" seventh scale degree (one of those pesky accidentals Levitin dislikes) so that it is a half-step below the key center (g-sharp in a-minor instead of the g-natural the key signature would call for) in order to provide a cadence as satisfying as the normal defining cadence in the major key. But this is getting too technical, and may be why the author avoided these discussions. After all, this is a book for the general reader and one must simplify things that are sometimes difficult to simplify.

Another time he uses the argot of commercial rock music in a way that would be confusing to people trained in traditional musical grammar (what is usually called music theory). At one point, he is writing fondly of the music of Joni Mitchell and her difficulty in finding a bass player who is sympathetic to and compatible with her approach to the sound of her music. Levitin recounts a conversation with Mitchell when they talked about most bass player wanting to play the roots of the chords of her music when she didn't want them to play roots, just play something that sounds good. OK. But bass lines don't always play the root note of every chord. That would be idiotic and boring. So, they do add passing tones and other "non-harmonic" tones. The problem wasn't that the bass players were so dim as to want to play only the fundamental notes of the chord (which would be boring indeed), but that they wanted defined harmonies at each moment in the piece, but Joni views her music more linearly. She can let harmonies from one chord linger into the sound of the next chord. Mitchell hears the music going from here to there and the stuff in between is a path between the departure and arrival points, but might not be a traditional triad. OK. That is fine. It is called voice leading or counterpoint. But pop musicians usually don't study that aspect of music.

It is important to note that much of music is not really analyzable without understanding voice leading. Not everything is just chord-chord-chord outside of the freshman four part chorale writing exercises. Believe me, there is no harmonic structure that Joni Mitchell is going to create that hasn't been done before, no matter how unique or personal her "sound" or timbre as Levitin likes to call it.

Anyway, it is clear that Levitin approaches music from the point of view of pleasure and the joy of sound rather than the idea of meaning because that is much harder to define let alone map in the brain. When the author is talking about the parts of the brain that are activated when listening to music, it is all quite interesting and I enjoyed it very much. He is very enamored of the idea of schema and taps into the Chomsky model of generative grammar, a model that has had tremendous descriptive power, but has been quite lacking in explanatory power.

The author uses the idea of the subtle rhythmic and pitch changes that a Frank Sinatra or other master musician uses as creating their effects because they violate some sort of schema built into our brains. It is true that we do try to impose order on anything. We want things to fit together and will stick purposes in where there isn't one. However, the kind of subtle changes Levitin describes are called expression by musicians for a reason. Just as we emphasize words and meanings in our speech or movement by stressing something by making it earlier or later than its peers, or louder or softer, or part of a pattern that is somehow different than what one would normally expect, we also do that in music. But it is noticing a difference in relation to what is around it rather than something universal. We don't feel that a piece that is 60 beats a minute is somehow fast or slow because of our brains, we hear what is IN the piece and decide if the tempo is appropriate, too fast (dense) or too slow (not much happening). We want a certain amount of activity based on our human experience of reality. If there is a lot happening in the piece we perceive it as we would perceive an activity in real life with a lot of things happening and would feel similar emotions. But again, this is too technical.

I was also fascinated when he discussed the redundant structures in the nerves going from our ears to our brain. He talks about it having a part to play in our startle reflex. However, I also wonder if loud sounds don't cause strong enough pressure waves on our skin to cause those nerves to become involved as well and from there to the spinal column. But I don't know anything about this except from my own experience at being startled.

Just one of the many interesting observations the author makes concerns the role of talent in success. He describes a study done in which young people are rated by experts as to their talent in a given field. A longitudinal study is done and an analysis of who ended up successful shows that there is a factor much more powerful than native talent. The author points out that the most important factor in success is 10,000 hours of work in that field. This corresponds deeply to my own experience.

When young people ask me what they can do to learn to play the piano, I tell them to play five million notes. I don't care which ones. After the first million they will get bored of playing with their fists, knees, nose, or whatever and by the third million they will be taking it seriously. And I suppose it would take about 10,000 hours to play that many notes. I have also taught my children that talent is a multiplier of work. So a talent of 10 that multiplies a work effort of 1 loses out to a talent of 5 that multiplies a work effort of 100 and loses by a lot.

In any case, this is a fascinating book regardless of my slight disagreements and likely misunderstandings of what the author is saying. I am sure you will find a lot to enjoy and I recommend it with enthusiasm.

Author Daniel Levitin manages to make boring several fascinating subjects--neuroscience, psychology, music, and philosophy--in one fell swoop. This book's subtitle is "The Science of a Human Obsession," but nary a word is dedicated to explaining musical obsession (and obsession is a well defined clinical term). Too bad that's the smallest of Levitin's expository transgressions, because, even worse, not enough is said about music and its effects on the brain, which is a crime, considering the amount of MRI study available to researchers these days. Instead, the first chapters in the book trudge the reader through a dull explanation of basic music theory, including rudimentary explanations of the overtone series and rhythmic components of music. The book includes many misleading sections, including discussions on absolute pitch and the definition of musical talent. Levitin continues to support the idea once propagated by a medical journal that an artist attains expertise through 10,000 hours of practice (which is about three hours a day for a 10-year period), whether the activity is playing music or writing fiction. However, such an assertion does not prove causality when it comes to displaying musical talent. Perhaps the artist displayed early talent for the activity, and as a result became committed to practicing it for the next 10 years. This book would be more readable if Levitin could manage to illustrate his ideas with real, relevant narrative (Malcolm Gladwell, author of "The Tipping Point" and "Blink" is very talented in this respect.) I guess I'll take Levitin's word for it that his scientific work is important, and that his previous career as a record producer gave him a special insight into music that much of the scientific community completely lacks, but this book is too tedious for the layreader (for whom it must be intended given its basic explanations of music and neuroscience), and far too basic for anyone who knows anything about music theory, neuroscience, psychology, or philosophy of the mind. The only narrative elements in the book discuss how Levitin got to know people in the music business, how he chased after a professor he respected until he was out of breath, how he saw Sonny Rollins perform live, and how he hates to dissect monkey brains, among a few other forgettable vignettes, but what do any of these stories have to do with the connection between music and mind? Finally, the name-dropping of famous people does not make up for poor exposition of ideas.

Half-whispered in the background, it's hard to get too far away from suspicion. The question remains: Does analyzing music scientifically take away from the aesthetic appreciation?

I had once thought of music as the ultimate proof of the glorious irrelevancy of science. But it's really no different than any other pleasure. Does learning cosmology detract from the beauty of a star filled night? Can a couple of physics lessons dull the gaping excitement of seeing a massive rainbow absorb the sky? I conquered this ambivalence personally, while lying in the sun, on a hot day, at altitude, following a final in a physics class. Everything clicked together in my head, the nuclear reaction I watch sizzling eight minutes and eighteen seconds ago, the light as waves, the heat as energy, the energy as mass, the waves as particles. It all clicked, and it was fine. We were all vibrating together in the same rich meaninglessness, and a good feeling felt good whether I purposefully conquered every little detail or it blindsided me and left my head spinning.

That's the day I got it. That science is not a static pool of knowledge. It is not a religion. It is not a method. It is a process, and a spiritual one at that. That was the day, lying there, absorbing photons and resonating passively in the hum, the Ohmmmmm. Science is as much a quest as any other system of belief. And nothing is off limits. Nothing is reduced by knowing that another layer of explanation can be sought out.

And what better subject to tackle scientifically than the beauty of music. Like consciousness, like science, music too is an arbitrary punctuation around organically transmitted, unconsciously determined, preferred patterns of influenced interactions.

So, how's the book?

Not bad. He does a nice job of illustrating the importance of music in our lives and the emotional impact music can convey. He has a nice introductory section where he defines the basic terms of music such as pitch, rhythm, tempo. It's the kind of stuff you get the first week in a music appreciation class, and Levitin does a nice job with it. He never takes his eye off the bigger questions though, for example, he opens his definition of pitch with the disclaimer: "Pitch is a purely psychological construct." He then needs an introduction to neuroscience before he can connect the two streams, discussing the hotter than ever topics of mind, brain, and consciousness. Of course, he has to throw in a little introduction to evolutionary theory as well.

The mistake armchair Anthropologists frequently fall into is taking a complicated concept, music in this case, or intelligence in other infamous cases, and reify it as if it were a single discrete thing. So let's come up with theories of selection for musicality as if it were the scientific equivalent of Mendel's wrinkled garden peas. But Levitin does a nice job of showing how different parts of the brain process different aspects of music. He gives a nice sense of the complexity involved and the parallel processing necessary between different realms of music. If you think about it, this should come as no surprise to anyone who has listened to a one-year old discover language. They can babble with the rhythms, intonations, and prosody of fluent speech well before they have the actual words. It should come as no surprise to any musician, anyone who has experienced that moment when the execution shifts from working memory to procedural memory. My favorite part of playing the piano is reaching the point where my cerebellum and basal ganglia are doing the heavy lifting. Then I can sit back and enjoy the music, like some kind of twisted grandiose self-sycophantic fan, without thinking about what I'm doing.

So formulating the question as "What evolutionary advantages were conferred on individuals who exhibit musical behaviors?" is a mental exercise. A fun and pleasantly meaningless one. Musical sensibility is much more likely an offshoot of multiple smaller functions of the brain, such as language processing, mother-infant interactions, the novelty seeking and cognitive flexibility behind creativity, or empathy, all of which individually may respond over time to certain selective forces. This does not mean, as Steven Pinker and the Blank Slaters would assert, that music is a meaningless accident. It is a part of all the systems that contribute to it, an echo of numerous other functions that comprise our humanity.

When a music lover hypothesizes that musical instincts may have been the prime factor in promoting the cognitive development of the species, it is no more a sophisticated argument than when a drug enthusiast, such as Terrance McKenna, proposes that psychedelics were the primary force behind the expansion of the human cranium. Isn't it funny? No matter how far we come, we're still story tellers creating creation myths in our own image. So my personal hypothesis: The primary force behind the evolution of human intelligence is the drive to drink Tanqueray and play backgammon while listening to Gabby La La. You heard it hear first. Evidence pending.

It is an ambitious book in its scope, especially when the conversation also needs to be liberally peppered with references to Philip Glass and John Cage, Bernstein and Bach, Sinatra and Parker. Well, you know musicians love showing off their chops. Anyway, thumbs up for a solid, thought-provoking read. You've just got to appreciate anyone who uses "mirror neurons" and "iPods" in the same sentence.

pp. 28-29: "One of the several notes we call A has a frequency of 55 Hz and all other notes called A have frequencies that are two, three, four, five (or a half) times this frequency." This is simply wrong. The other notes called A are 110 Hz, 220 Hz, 440 Hz, 880 Hz - that is, you double (or halve) frequencies to produce octaves. The author claims to know music and science and yet gets this basic fact of musical science wrong?

p. 60: "Think of 'Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star,' written by Mozart when he was six years old." It was not written by Mozart, it is a French song called "Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman." Later in life (not in childhood), Mozart composed some variations on the song, as did many other composers.

I read a book to learn something new. But if I see mistakes about things I already know, how can I trust the author about things I don't know? Mistakes this elementary, moreover, raise the question of editing. Did no one with a basic competency in music read this book before it was published? Did Keith Lockhart, who surely knows the relationship between frequencies, read the book before he wrote - or signed - a blurb for it?

This book is carelessly written and edited, with a surprisingly large number of factual errors and misstatements of various kinds. I had high hopes for it, but I came away disappointed, even angry. Although there is some valuable material (p. 187 is great), too much is unacceptably sloppy. The music-theoretical explanations tend to be simplistic and misleading. Some are wrong. Trouble starts early, with a definition of "the A minor scale" as "the one minor scale that uses only the white notes of the piano keyboard." But this "natural" minor scale is not analogous to C major in the way Levitin is implying. The observation that Beethoven's Fifth "restates a melody using different instruments" trivializes a sophisticated musical language. "Shave and a haircut" and "Gee Officer Krupke" are not the same rhythm, though Levitin says they are. (They're related, but not identical; it would have been illuminating to discuss the difference.) Mozart did not write "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" at age 6 (or any other age) though he did compose variations on it. (Levitin's claim that the stress pattern in this tune is TWINkle twinkle LITtle star is peculiar, or at least highly debatable.) The definition of a "whole note" as a note that "lasts four beats" is unhelpful. The claim that 6/8 is a "somewhat common meter in which we count six beats to a measure and each eighth note gets one beat" will be news to most practicing musicians, for whom this meter normally has two beats. Schoenberg is lazily called a "contemporary" composer though he died in 1951. The note C is defined as the "dominant" note of a piece in the key of C, which is bound to confuse anyone who is subsequently taught what a "dominant" is. Another problematic sentence: "Musicians refer to the pleasing-sound chords and intervals as consonant and the unpleasing ones as dissonant." But this is not what musicians understand by consonance and dissonance. Levitin's analysis of the slow movement of the Haydn Surprise Symphony doesn't jibe with the music; he says that "the main melodic idea spans barely more than half an octave, a perfect fifth" -- and so what? -- but the first 4 bars cover an octave, and the first 8 bars an eleventh. Another puzzling sentence: "There is nothing intrinsically catlike about the word cat or even any of its syllables [sic]" And what about the author's dismissal of "attempts to please the audience through musical obsequies [sic] rather than through soul." I cannot imagine a classical musician who would not wince at "Many of the greatest musicians of our era lacked formal training.... in classical music, George Gershwin, Mussorgsky, and David Helfgott are among those who lacked formal training..." Leaving aside the "unmusicality" of the repetitive writing, it is time to stop exploiting poor David Helfgott, who, however much he suffered personally, is not considered "one of the greatest classical musicians of this era" by any serious practitioner. Levitin must be a more responsible researcher and sincere music-lover than this book suggests, and I'm sure his intentions were good. Perhaps Levitin's editor is more to blame than he himself is. The objections I've listed may seem niggling. I've listed them for two reasons: 1) it would take too much space to discuss larger issues, and 2) I think such mistakes are evidence of the book's overall carelessness. Some books I would recommend instead of this one are more technical but also more stimulating and informative, notably Music and Memory by Bob Snyder and the recent Sweet Anticipation by David Huron.

As a professional musician and an amateur scientist (that is, I studied science in college before pursuing music as a career), I found this book to be condescending and packed with needless and uninformative drivel. I had hoped for a detailed and fascinating book that would shed light on such curious questions as to why humans developed music, why some people are more musical than others, and why we get songs stuck in our heads so easily. I was extremely disappointed that instead of a discussion of these subjects written for an intelligent reader with a basis in either music or science, the author seemed to believe that his audience would be people who had a background in neither field--something I would think would be highly unlikely in a person taking the time to read a book with such a focus. There were far too many dull anecdotes about all the famous musicians the author had had the pleasure of meeting (perhaps he was trying to impress his non-musician readers?), and wading through the name-dropping to find the very few facts and scientific theories in the book was not terribly rewarding. I can recall approximately three interesting facts that I learned from the book, which would explain all the filler--if all he'd written were the three discoveries he'd made, the book would have been only seven pages long.

If you're interested in this book and its ideas, I suggest you find a copy that some college student was required to read and hope they underlined the three important facts for you. It will save you a lot of time.

This is possibly the most sloppily written and edited book I have ever come across. Individually, the inaccuracies, poorly framed arguments, and misstatements probably don't seem to amount to much, but the cumulative effect is at the least disconcerting.

Some slightly random examples:

On page 30, the distance between "do" and "re" (as in "Doe a deer...") is identified as a whole step or a tone. Levitin explains that since "tone" has other meanings in music, he will use "whole step" "to avoid ambiguity." But there's a smaller division in our scale, that "cuts a whole step perceptually in half." So of course he calls it.... a semitone. Not a half-step? He goes on to talk about scales made up of whole steps and semitones, which seems twice as ambiguous.

Some slips may be typos, but I suspect they aren't. On page 29, doubling or halving the frequency of a sound wave ("2:1 or 1:2") is correctly identified as producing an octave relationship. That's repeated correctly on page 72, but later on the same page he says that "a ration of 3:1 is a simple integer ratio, and that defines two octaves." It's a simple integer ration, but it isn't two octaves; if 2:1 defines one octave, you double the 2 to get the second octave, so a ration of 4:1 defines two octaves. The frequencies of the A's in the vicinity of middle C on your piano are 220, 440, and 880.

On page 62, Levitin quotes the opening of "That'll Be the Day" to illustrate a pickup -- a note or gesture that precedes the first strong beat of a musical phrase -- but the text he gives leaves out a word: the initial "Well" -- the upbeat he is supposedly illustrating. On the next page he continues his assault on the song, using it to misinterpret "syncopation." It isn't the beat (the foot-tap) that shifts, it's the accent (the stress) that is displaced to a weak part of the beat.

The illustration of "Ba Ba Black Sheep" immediately above this example is supposed to show the temporal relation of syllables in two lines of the song; Levitin assures us that he has "kept the spacing between syllables proportional to how much time is spent on them." But the spacing is completely off; none of the temporal units line up properly, so is at best useless. Unfortunately, since it's there, it's also misleading.

The discussion of "Jailhouse Rock" on page 61 is rendered literally meaningless by his use of "note" instead of "beat." And on and on it probably goes.

I realize these may seem like a series of carefully picked nits, but the cumulative effect is annoying, and for an unsuspecting novice, could be pretty baffling. The only way to get through this text is to read it as carelessly as it was written, and that has begun to look like a waste of time.

A good writer with a unique background, Levitin presents facts and ideas useful for musicians, ordinary music lovers, and everyone who cares about brains. His interview on NPR (Diane Rehm, Aug. 3) includes musical examples. The first chapters may be scanned by trained musicians and by those who have little interest in music theory to get to the unique material in the book.
--EJL (psychiatrist and amateur cellist)

I had expected, based on the many favorable reviews here, that this would be a great book. I have more to read, so my opinion may change, but the beginning 100 pages are so in need of editing and so full of unstated assumptions and misinformation (particualrly in the singularly benighted discussion of scales -- really only the relatively recent scales of western equal temperament instrument) that I would suggest overhauling that whole patch.
OK, perhaps the intent is to write a "user-friendly" version of a complex phenomenon -- musical perception, musical cognition (including memory), musical performance, musical enjoyment, and the neuroscience of music, maybe including discussions of various kinds of "musical" communication and behaviors that go beyond our usual experiences (such as bardic memorization and 'primitive' mapping of physical topographies to musical representation (a la 'Songlines').
But the mush of the first section of the book trivializes the issues, and the errors therein make me sceptical that the latter part of the book will recover to deal with these issues in a manner worth the time to read. At this point in my reading I understand why Steven Pinker is not going out of his way to take advantage of Levitin's collaboration, even though the examination of the language and thinking issues dealt with by Pinker and his colleagues over the past 20 years could benefit (I think) from study of many aspects of the 'music experience' that Levitin mentions, such as our immense capacity to remember music, to remember lyrics with music, to identify from the slightest cue music that we haven't heard for years, to express rhythmic and metric patterns of enormous complexity, to use musical memory as a vehicle on which to hang other modes of memory/performance, to identify 'style' and performance differences (in terms both of musical performances and of other acoustical features -- such as the characteristics of performing halls, microphones, audio tape brands, instruments). I'm hoping that these will be actually addressed in the reading I have ahead of me.
Completing the book hasn't made me change my general impression -- that this book is anecdotally charming (and tiring), poorly organized, and in need of much editing and revision (not to mention the typos/errors). However, the last chapter could serve as a first draft for the beginning of the book I thought/hoped this would be: a statement of some of the issues that have to deal with the evidence for human music-making over time, the evolutionary advantages that this ability to make music provides, the physiological/neurological mechanisms involved, a discussion of a variety of music systems in that context of brain activity, and differential studies that examine behaviors of unusual syndromes, prodigies, "idiots savant" and autistic musical individual, along with the relationship with the mechanisms of language -- including the differentiation between the "rule" normalizations, irregular forms, and performative aspects of recognition, memory, and performance.
I don't know how the book got the "blurbs" it did, unless only the last chapter was distributed for comment.

I am a profesional musician with experience in popular, classical and jazz music. I am a music teacher with a full professorship, and I was excited to read this book, but can't remember the last time I was so dissapointed. It is rambling and poorly organized, filed with irrelevant fluff, presenting ideas and concepts and then straying from the explanation for paragraphs or pages. It is filled with narcissistic anecdotes that do nothing except to highlight the author's sense of self importance. And it is filled with musical and historical innacuracies and irrelevancies, not to mention typos and grammatical errors (where was the content and style editor on this project?).

There are many references to popular songs that are ludicrous. Who remembers the background vocals to a Sly and the Family Stone song from 40 years ago?

It is really unfortunate that there was not a stronger oversight, because Mr. Levitin has a wealth of interesting information linking neurology, musical perception and creativity.

To be specific regarding the innacuracies and ludicrous information, here are just a few:

On page 21, what's the point of telling us that Isaac Newton was kicked out of school? To encourage rock and roll college dropouts?

The Zen koan, "If a tree falls in the forest...." on page 22 is wrongly attributed to an Irish philosopher.

Any composer knows that the simplist way to establish a key is not necessarily to play the tonic "loud and long." This is actually so ridiculous as to be laughable. This could be the perception of a rock and roll drummer who never learned music but knows how to keep the beat. A good example of words assuming importance and truth just because they are printed. (page 36)

Contrary to the author's contention, Indian music DOES use planned microtones. Talk to a sitar or bansuri flute player. They do hear music differently.

Mozart DID NOT write Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. Look it up.

This is really a short catalouge of stuff - and I only got as far as page 76. Don't know if I can take any more sifting through the dross to get to the gems. Buy this book at your own risk.

I taught a course called "Sound, Music and Noise" for a number of years and did some psychophysical research on the perception of music. Thus, following a review in the Boston Globe of "This Is Your Brain on Music", I hoped that this book would further my understanding of how our mind perceives music. This book did not meet my expectations. There was very little information that furthered my understanding of the perception of music. Yes, Levitin did talk about sections of the brain that are involved and how techniques are improving, but this book seems as if it was written as a promise of further work yet to be done and much speculation, rather than many definitive answers. I was put off by several glaring errors in the first chapter ("What is Music?"), such as on pp. 28-29 Levitin says " One of the several notes we call A has a frequency of 55 Hz and all the other notes called A have frequencies that are two, three, four, five (or half) times this frequency." He should have said two, four, eight (etc.) times that frequency. If there are such errors in the section where I have some expertise, what errors might lurk where I don't have the knowledge to detect them? I was also put off by what seemed to be his ego trip about how many famous people he had met and how many pieces of music he knew.

I'm a musician who's been thinking about reading this book since seeing it favorably reviewed. I read it after receiving it as a gift this Christmas, and unfortunately found it to read like an extended Wikipedia entry. Opinions and speculation are stated as facts, claims are not justified with evidence, the author frequently oversteps his expertise, and the writing is otherwise amateurish, lacking direction and leaving loose ends. It seems as though the author wrote it off the top of his head without researching his points or his examples, and a number of statements are false. Other reviewers have listed their pet gripes (some of which have been fixed in the paperback copy), here are a few of mine that haven't been mentioned (and that still exist in the paperback):

-The detailed discussion of the Haydn's Surprise Symphony theme (p92-93) is flawed at every turn: He uses the term parallelism (a term reserved for describing a particular harmonic device) incorrectly to refer to the melody. He describes the melody as going up "just a little" when what we have at that point is the *largest interval leap* anywhere in the theme. Then, "the highest note we've encountered so far" in the melody is incorrectly identified as the fifth. We have already (just two notes ago) heard the C above the G he is referring to. (The highest note is the tonic, not the fifth). Finally, the "surprise" in the Surprise symphony, is identified in the wrong place--eight measures too soon. Why so much detail about something the author hasn't researched? Not only that, but the misunderstandings lead him to bad analysis.

-In one of the book's stupidest sentences, the author claims that "A schema for Dixieland includes foot-tapping, up-tempo music, and unless the band was trying to be ironic, we would not expect there to be overlap between their repertoire and that of a funeral procession" (p117). Dixieland bands playing funeral processions is, of course, an important and well-known New Orleans tradition.

-Beethoven's Ode to Joy theme from his 9th symphony is used as an example of violating expectations (p 119). He describes that we expect the first phrase to end on "do" and we are surprised to hear it end on "re." In the second phrase we are surprised to hear it end on "do" after hearing the first phrase end on "re." Most musicians would disagree with this analysis. This phrase structure is so common, in fact, that there are terms for paired phrases such as this. (The first phrase, typically ending on a member of the dominant chord as happens here, is called the antecedent. The second phrase ending on the tonic is called the consequent. Together the pairing is called a period, or informally a call-and-response.) What is described here as Beethoven's clever violation of expectation is a very good example of the very most common phrase structure in all of music.

-Later, in describing how jazz musicians play over AABA song form (p238-239), Dr. Levitin explains that the "B" section is the "chorus." I think you'll find that by far the most common term for the B section is the *bridge,* the term "chorus" being reserved for one entire iteration of the form. He goes on to describe this as a point of confusion, but it's not if you use the usual terms. Confused himself, he also says "Some songs have a C section, called the bridge." One of his own examples, "All of Me" is ABAC. However, most musicians would say that this song has no bridge, and certainly the C section of "All of Me" cannot be considered the bridge.

I don't have the time or the space for a line-by-line critique of the entire book, but suffice it to say that my examples are not cherry-picked (rather the positive aspects in some reviews seem to be cherry picked, and some of the positive reviews are not so positive). The writing throughout the book is imprecise, inaccurate, misleading, and interspersed with nonsense. The anecdotes make up a conspicuously large portion of the book, and are conspicuously self-serving (dropping the names of rock stars and famous scientists). He has an entire chapter on meeting Crick (of the DNA-discovering pair Watson and Crick). According to the author's account, he was nervous, and had a past memory that kept him from introducing himself. What a relief to find that after finally meeting, Crick enjoyed his company and found his research fascinating! ("Crick's eyes lit up. He sat up straight in his chair. 'Music,' he said. He brushed away his lepton colleague.") On reflection, the topic of music and the brain seems less the main point of the book, and more a jumping off point for a superficial, glowing autobiography. I was disappointed.

A university thesis gone wrong. Don't waste your time with this book. It lacks any form of continuity, and the writer rambles about various topics, dragging his points all over the place. I wish I could have gotten a condensed version of the better parts and key points of the book since most of it is a mess. I picked it up after reading two magazine articles about this book, but unfortunately, the articles put me under the impression that the main topic of this books was going to be about one thing I was interested in (timbre of recordings and their importance on pop music), but it was not. It did touch on that topic--if only a little--but the author really managed to ramble his way through the rest of the book with only a few moderately interesting points. Get to the point, author! No thanks or wasting precious hours of my life!

Of this book's many shortcomings, these are the most blatant: arrogance, ignorance, vagueness. One example of each:

Arrogance: Levitin and Joni Mitchell discuss how the harmonies in her music can be interpreted in various ways (which is why Jaco Pastorius's fluid bass-lines fit so well). "This, then, we figured out at dinner that night, was one of the secrets of why Joni's music sounds unlike anyone else's" (p. 211). Even if this were true, a little modesty would serve Levitin well.

Ignorance: "When Copeland [sic] and Bernstein were composing, orchestras played their works and the public enjoyed them. [But now] contemporary "classical" music is ... listened to by almost no one; ... it is a purely intellectual exercise, and save for the rare avant-garde ballet company, no one dances to it either" (p. 257). Whether one likes or dislikes the music of Philip Glass and John Cage (whom he names as examples), Levitin's claim that these composers pursue(d) a "purely intellectual exercise" belies his lack of respect and understanding. Should one also assume that Levitin believes this to be true of György Ligeti, John Adams, and many of his own colleagues who are "classical" composers?

Vagueness: "Rhtyhm is what we dance to, sway our bodies to, and tap our feet to" (p. 55). Sure; but Levitin continues thus: "In so many jazz performances, the part that excites the audience most is the drum solo." Is he joking? This is like saying, "In so many museums, the part that excites visitors most is the Impressionist art."

Throughout the book, Levitin tries hard to come off as hip and smart. This would have been a great book in the hands of a more capable (and humble) writer.

I am a musician, a music teacher, and a graduate student in music education, and while I am still in the middle of reading this book, I am very puzzled as to how certain pages were allowed to be published.

While Levitin's questions are great conversation starters, and really make your brain think hard about how we hear and perceive sounds/music/etc, I was shocked to see that WRONG facts were being published.

For example, on page 60, Levitin states that Mozart was the composer of the Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star melody, and at age 6! This is a common misconception, but any classical musician (or avid fan of classical music) would know that it is false. The French melody was written in 1761 and is titled, "Ah ! vous dirai-je, Maman." Unlike some of his other minor mistakes that Levitin defended by saying they were typos that have now been edited in the books 13th printing, this is not a typo, but simply WRONG information.

I will continue to read the book, although it makes me wonder how many other errors I will find. I would hate to have to second guess everything I read, otherwise, what is the point of reading it?

Lots of fluff and name dropping.

And then this..

Wagner "has always disturbed me profoundly, and not just his music but the idea of listening to it. I feel reluctant to give into the seduction of music created by so disturbed a mind and so dangerous (or impenetrably hard) a heart as his, for I fear I may develop some of the same ugly thoughts."

Seriously?

I had heard much about this book on radio, and seen features about the author on TV and in the news. As a practicing musician I would love to know more about what actually happens physically when one performs, hears or otherwise experiences music. For all these reasons I began this book with pretty high expectations.

To begin with, two long chapters--eighty pages, or almost a third--of "This is Your Brain on Music" are devoted to explaining the basics of music, pitch and rhythm, for what is assumed to be a non-musician reader. While Levitin's efforts in this area are certainly considerate, they are unnecessary for anyone with even a modicum of previous training and moreover, not all that clear, in my opinion, to anyone who hasn't had that training. Subsequent chapters on the perception of music, the role expectation plays in a listener's perception, and recognition do go on to topics of considerably more interest. It is fascinating, for example, to try and figure out why people can recognize transpositions and variations of a familiar melody, for example. Such perception has been impossible to duplicate mechanically. The penultimate chapter grapples with a question that other scientists and educators have debated for eons--does musical "talent" really exist? Levitin mulls this over and arrives at this result: "The best guess that scientists currently have about the role of genes and the environment in complex cognitive behaviors is that each is responsible for about 50 percent of the story." How's that for hedging one's bets?

This parsing of material that has real interest, only to arrive at a lame or non-committal conclusion, unfortunately happens all too often in "This is Your Brain on Music." Moreover, the rambling and uneven tone of the text itself, which veers between self-consciously non-technical (using nonsense syllables to convey pulse, say) and densely scientific terminology, at times on the same page, further tends to obscure Levitin's intermittently illuminating observations. Long digressions to relate important moments in the author's life (famous people he met and worked with, mostly) and frequent quips impart a rather chummy tone (see, I'm not really a cold, analytical scientist, but just like you) but again lead the reader away from rather than toward the central points the author wants to make. There is worthwhile information to be gleaned, ultimately, from "This is Your Brain on Music:" but I finished the book feeling like I'd had to work too hard to dig it out.

This was an amazing read that I absolutely could not put down. This is exactly the book I have been waiting years for. It is written for people with a deep interest in both science and music; I believe that many "engineer/scientist by day and musician by night" types will love this book. Best of all, it does not require a deep understanding of music, psychology, or neurology (although one of Levitin's premises seems to be that we ALL have a deep understanding of music, whether we know it or not!)

Levitin starts out with a chapter or so on his background and music theory. As many reviewers have mentioned, the music theory presented here (and throughout the book) may not be new material for practicing musicians, but it does lay a good groundwork for many of the definitions and ideas that Levitin uses throughout the text.

Moving on to the rest of the book, Levitin has an interesting style that I found riveting. The book is not highly dense with ideas - it is not a textbook. It often takes several pages to come to a point. However, in these pages, Levitin is either giving historical information about how the current theories have come about, telling anecdotes related to the topic, or explaining laboratory results that have shed light on the topic.

Please do not misunderstand the intent of this book . . . it is not a thesis, a textbook, a journal article, etc. It should not be used as a primary source for information on any of the topics presented. And Levitin lays this out in the forward. This book is geared toward a much broader audience.

For a musicican, for one trained as a musician, this is a heady intellectual book. However, it often misses the point - entirely, aesthetically, and in practical terms. For instance, a piece practiced a 1000 times, according to the author, should be peerless. Obviously, this is not true. The native talent of the performer is paramount, and, most of all, the piece may be practiced WRONGLY 1000 times, of which, as a non-performer, the author is clearly unaware. The author also almost completely ignores the influence and insight of professional classical performers. The author is an administrator and impressario of rock and probably rap bands. The author has no training in musicology, and probably never talked to a musicologist. I admire the intent, but there are no breakthroughs here in understanding, or enjoying music, and no great insights into music's magic.

This book is divided into 3 sections. Nearly half the book deals with the technical basics of what defines and characterizes music, a tedious block of chapters that could have been reduced to an enlarged glossary. The second section is the more interesting, since neuroscience and cognition is at last treated, and here Levitin discusses some new experimental information on the mysterious processes that make music a unique and emotionally powerful form of language and communication. However, it is too short and rather sketchy, and we are left thirsty for more and more detailed information. The final quarter of the book is taken up in a hodge-podge of topics, from the predilections toward certain musical tastes, to the qualities of musicianship, to evolutionary origins of music, all of which could be a book in themselves. Indeed, the several books of Joachim-Ernst Berendt are far more worthy in dealing with these various subjects. Thus, only about 1/4 of the book actually approaches the specific subject of the title, with only a couple of pages mentioning how music triggers the pleasure pathways and regions involved in addiction and obsession, aspects that bring a philosophic attribute into biochemistry. Scattered throughout the book are references to popular Western music, jazz, and classic compositions, in order to provide some reference points for the readership. World music, which has a wider spectrum of timbre, so important in his discussion, is barely scratched. In short, I was disappointed with the book as being insufficiently focused.

Think about earworms, you know, those tunes that you can't stop playing back in your head.

Now we'll play a little game. We'll take some ordinary English sentences but dress them up in smartypants neuroscience language. So instead of saying "in your head" you say "in your brain". And instead of saying "idea" you say "neural pathways representing a concept". You can probably make up your own rules for converting English to Neurospeak. "I have a headache" might become "a neural excitiation in my brain is causing the my pain sensors to represent pain in my cerebral area" or "I remember that book" might become "signals from my optic nerve are analysed and compared with prior stored representations of books until a match is found" and so on. Anyone can play, it's easy.

Dan Levitin knows how to play. Here's what he has to say on earworms: "Our best explanation is that the neural circuits representing a song get stuck in `playback mode'". Cute eh? But here's the weird thing. He doesn't realise this is just a game you can play with language. He thinks these are actually scientific explanations. In fact he spends 300 pages writing trivial things about music in Neurospeak, presenting it as science. It's like Moliere's joke about explaining how opium works by saying it has "soporific virtue".

It's not completely content-free however. For example he has a quote from Newton pointing out that you can't see the colour of light waves, rather that light waves are what you use to see things in colour. Bizarrely Newton made no such claim because he believed light was made of particles, not waves. The point still stands, but how did a completely fictional quote like that get through? Is it acceptable to make up quotes from scientists to make your point?

At one point Levitin tells us all about the mistake of Cartesianism - the idea that the things we sense in the world are just encoded in a new representation that some inner self can view, as if the external world is presented on an inner screen in our brains. That, of course, leads to an infinite regress. Who watches the inner screen? This is all well and good, but throughout the book Levitin describes a model of the brain that is 100% Cartesian. For example, he says that when we hear a sound, the end of the journey is a mental image of that sound. He seems to have missed the point that the philosphers he quotes, Wittgenstein and Dennett, devoted much of their lives to demolishing such a silly picture.

I did find the discussion of the roots of Joni Mitchell's chords quite interesting however, not that I like Joni Mitchell. But that saves the book from one star.

Oh, and Levitin does know a lot of famous people, if you're impressed by that sort of thing.

Sure, the small portion of the book devoted to science is somewhat sound, but the poor writing style, the annoying narrative, and the constant name-dropping speaks to who this guy must be. This book is his 15 minutes of fame, he needs to enjoy it now. Check out the lack of any other sound publications to see just who he is.

I find it very hard to provide a single opinion on this book. The author seems to think very highly of himself, but he probably should, given his education and experience. I have some poor musical skills myself and I learned a tremendous amount about musical theory, which explains the disastrous results I've had composing. I gained a new respect for those musicians I know who play well and yet make it look easy. After reading the book I find myself listening to music in a new way, as I think about the music I'm hearing. Some of the brain theory got tedious and was a little out of my grasp, but then, that's sort of the point of the book. The author did at least partially address questions I had going in about the mood-altering properties of music.

In short, read the other reviews here. I think I can agree on some level with most of them. The book isn't a page-turner, it doesn't answer every question I had, but it was certainly worth reading, and I'll be thinking about some of the things it said for a long time to come, I'm sure.

Parts of this book really blew me away. I loved reading about the reasons why certain music appeals to me, the connections that are being made in my brain and the evolutionary development of a love for music. I gained a greater appreciation for musicians in general and especially those who take risks in their composition.

I found some of the technical information hard to follow, though. I am neither a professional musician nor a professional scientist, so I found myself sometimes lost in the details of science and music contained in this book.

My other major problem with this book was that Levitin referenced so many songs, using them as examples in his writing with the assumption that the average reader would immediately be able to bring to his or her mind the song and the part to which he referred. I know most, but not all, of the songs mentioned in this book, but I often had trouble "listening" in my mind to specific musical phenomena. I found myself stopping for long periods of time in my reading, desperately trying to think of a certain tune. This book should have come with a CD of all of the music Levitin mentions; I would have found it very helpful.

Professor Levitin's This Is Your Brain On Music is a wonderfully recounted journey into an unexplored knowledge block deep inside the science of music. That the author's witty and intimate writing style can entertain a multitude of audiences, is obvious from the opening chapter. How this book will become part of reference lists for several scientific disciplines unravels only later when the reader gets to subsume Levitin's range of expertise and competence in exploring those disciplines. For enthusiasts, here's an informative, fun book investigating human perception of music, its functionality, syntax and emotional levers. For fellow scholars, this book is an exquisite account that brings some great news and opens up a few cans of worms, just enough to incite `further investigation'.

Although i was personally quite disappointed with the book, I have given it a rating of 3 stars because it perhaps serves a role educating younger readers looking for a few interesting ideas or a general overview of music psychology.

As for me, I found myself skimming the pages as rapidly as possible, occasionally saying out loud in frustration, "Get to the point!" The few interesting ideas (such as that professional musicians tend to transfer activities from the right brain to the left) I had already picked up elsewhere.

I have nothing against the author. He seems friendly and nice enough, and has obviously spent a lot of time and effort researching the subject, coming to reasonable and well-supported positions. However, I do think a lot more (or better?) editing was called for, so that ideas were presented in a more organized way, and a lot of fluff and unnecessary repetition removed.

In summary, this could be an introduction to the subject if you have never thought about it before, but if you are a musician, and have thought at all about the psychology and evolution of music, even casually, and especially if you have kept up with the general media's coverage of new scientific research, this will not have anything to offer you. In addition, if you like writing to be dense with ideas and information (Oliver Sacks is a good example), this will be particularly frustrating.

While I appreciate Levitin's attempt (I find myself running out of books on music cognition to read these days), I was endlessly frustrated with the poor writing in the book. As a semi-professional researcher and musician, I do not have the luxury of poring over a book with vague descriptions of concepts I am highly intrigued with. It's possible that one cause for my frustration was the fact that I am much more used to reading journal articles (which are, thankfully, more succinct than Levitin's book) and have lost the ability to patiently wade through several hundred pages of fluff.

At the very least, reading this book has motivated me to write my own (one day), and it's somewhat comforting to know that it would probably not be hard to surpass the writing in this one.

Dan Levitin's "This is Your Brain on Music" is a rather unique book. I don't know any other book that bring together personal anecdotes from the music recording world, a wealth of current insights into how our brain allows us to even listen and enjoy music to the more arcane problems of how we structure our ideas into categories.

This may seem like a stretch, or even a hodge-podge of ideas, but Levitin masterfully makes this book into a casual and coherent walk in the park of all the many things that make music perception and cognition.

Clearly this book was written for the so-called "non-specialist". And the book carries an effortless style that will appeal to many readers who want to know more about the science of how we hear music, but also about how recording artists and music performers see music. Levitin chose a distinctly personal style which makes the book immediately accessible and eminently readable. He takes his time to explain concepts without dwelling on them and the book is throughout filled with interesting personal stories, whether it's chatting in Joni Mitchell's living room about short-fused Jaco Pastorius or trying to explain to the late John Pierce what the essence of rock music is.

Between all these we learn about surprise and anticipation in music, absolute pitch (and why we don't have to feel so bad about "not having it"), the stunning new insights into the role of the cerebellum in not only timing but emotion, all the way to Dan Levitin's view on the debate whether music is a primary function or coincidental side effect in the evolutionary development of us human beings.

But Levitin goes beyond describing the science, he gives us a wealth of ideas and opinions, many of which we yet have to find definite answers for. This makes this a book that is more than just a "non-specialist" treatment of the subject. It makes it into a source of stimulation and debate. I'm sure some will disagree with a number of things Levitin suggests, but beyond giving strong support for his position, he paints a larger and more compelling picture that gives us a broader view of why we possibly like music. This sure will stimulate interesting research as well as draw new people into the field of the neuroscience of music. This is also what makes this book so unique.

I only wish I could find more actual music examples, which are frequently cited in the book. Some can be found on the book's web-page but more would be nice. Luckily, as one finds in the book too, we can play back music inside our heads. If only I could remember all the songs...

For anybody who takes their first neuro-psych and/or cognition course in college: I highly recommend this as additional reading, because it will spice up this possibly dry topic, with many fascinating examples that we all tend to care about - music.

I was really looking forward to reading this book since I am both a brain researcher and a professional musician. First it was highly disorganized and rambled from subject to subject without any real framework. Much of what the author spoke of was not related to how the brain processes music but speaks to the way research is conducted. Even this was sparse at best. He attempted to explain the elements of music so that the majority of people could understand it. However it became too watered down and even lost me. Lastly the author was entirely too self congradulatory as to his own accomplishments. Pushing the envelope of science should be award enough. For these reasons I can not recommend this book.

I love music and I like science, and I have a bachelor's degree in journalism, but the technical parts of this book were too difficult for me to grasp. I am the 12th reviewer, and only the second one to have a problem with the text, so lots of Amazonians are smarter than I am. This intriguing title ended up taking me two weeks to slog through, and I did some skimming at the end. If you are a music lover who is neither musician nor scientist, do what I did: get it from the library and read the parts you can comprehend without worrying about the rest. There are lots of interesting nuggets as to why we react to music so strongly, but they need to be mined by sifting tons of neurological jargon first.

I had high hopes for this book. Unfortunately I only enjoyed maybe 2 of all the chapters in the book. Most of it is just too "brainy" in terms of the vocabulary that is used and the topics discussed. The chapter on expertise in music is interesting but not really back by much science. The last chapter is an interesting approach to the evolution of music and the chapter I enjoyed the most. Everything else I found very boring and hard to read. If you know a lot about the brain then you might enjoy this more.

I had assumed that this book was meant for a general audience and would enlighten me, as a non-musician, on the science behind the sensory experience of music. In certain sections, it lived up to these expectations. Discussion of the anthropology of music, comparing the concept of octaves and use of instruments across cultures and time, was brief but tantalizing. I appreciated even more the chapter dealing with development of musical expertise, with its conclusions that transcend the subject. In demolishing the "Mozart as prodigy" legend, Levitin explains how mastery in any domain seems to correlate with 10,000 hours of practice more than any genetic talent, a finding to inspire adult learners everywhere.
Unfortunately, the rest of the book did not live up to my hopes. The first chapter, a deconstruction of the physical properties of music, was discouragingly dry, as were later discussions of the auditory processing of sound. In a popular science work on the ability of music to affect us emotionally, I had expected more engaging prose than this example from page 35:
"... the placement of the half steps is very different than in the major scale; in the major scale, there is a half step just before the root that "leads" to the root, and another half step just before the fourth scale degree. In the minor scale, the half steps are before the third scale degree and before the sixth. "
There was also a little too much autobiographical narrative for my taste. Other reviewers have noted his tendency to name-drop. This is not always subtle: the title of Chapter 6 is "After Dessert, (Nobel Laureate) Crick was Still Four Seats Away from Me". This incongruously self-centered title refers to his attempts to cover the overlap between music, language and memory in human evolution. For more balanced and well-written work on these latter two subjects, see the books of Steven Pinker and Daniel Schacter, respectively.
This is a fascinating subject, reviewed by an accomplished scientist and musician. For those who are neither, more accomplished writing would have made it more compelling.

Dr. Levitin addresses connections between two areas often considered too technical and arcane to interest a general readership: brain science and music theory. However we all have experience as music listeners and hence a familiarity that gives the reader a personal relationship with the material. The book addresses the basics of music theory and brain function, providing enough background information to make the discussion of the inter-relationship understandable without getting lost in unnecessary detail. While some topics are simplified, the information is correct at the level it is presented. The book is thoroughly researched and provides references for the interested reader to pursue.

I find the personal anecdotes quite engaging, as they give a picture of the author's approach to discovery and the reasons for his attraction to the subject. Some of his conclusions are arguable, but that's the nature of the field: answers to the relevant questions are not all clearly determined yet. Overall, I recommend this book for anyone curious about how we may understand our love of music from a biological perspective.

Jay Kadis
Lecturer, CCRMA/Music Stanford University

Let me first say that I enjoyed reading this book. It helped me better understand both music and neuroscience. Music's influence on us is a fascinating and powerful subject.

That having been said, however, I do need to make at least one criticism. Levitin's evolutionary explanation for the development of music is egregiously one-sided. He suggests, with others, that music may be an outward demonstration of intelligence and physical prowess - look at me, I can afford to waste all this time and energy - akin to the male peacock's tail. THIS IS ALL WELL AND GOOD FOR MALES, BUT WHAT ABOUT FEMALES!? I read not one sentence in Levitin's book explaining what evolutionary theory would have to say about female singing. I'm willing to accept adaptive explanations for many things.. but in this case Levitin does little to ward off the inevitable criticism that his book features a number of very half-based "just so" stories.

Doing an undergrad and master's work in music performance and studying neuroscience as an interest at my alma mater, I came to this book with high hopes that were not fulfilled. Beginning with a jargon filled musical dictionary-like approach, Levitin takes the reader on a crash course through music and the brain. Pitch is nebulously described as a figment of the neural processes occurring in our brains (which any perceptual event could rightly be called). The chapters of this book are vaguely titled and abhorrently long with no organization. Trite quips round out this volume and leave the reader wanting clarity and concise thought. If you want to learn about music and neuroscience, buy a book on basic neuroscience and a recording of Bach's B minor Mass. You'll learn a lot more than this book tries to spoon feed.

I heard this book on NPR, and the author is a good speaker. Also he played good music. His book seemed more telling us who to listen to than how to listen. Name dropping.
"Music, the Brain and Ecstasy" was much better.

The reason I didn't give this 5 stars is because it might only appeal to readers who are curious about actual brain functions while listening to music as well as the simpler pure enjoyment of notes strung together in a pleasing way. Take a chance on it and just skip over the parts that go into too much depth - or read every word and be fascinated as I was. This makes a perfect gift. I got one for my son and one for my nephew.

I'm very surprised by how many negative reviews this book is getting. I just finished it, and I love it.

Are you considering reading it? Then, do!

I think the problem many people have is essentially that the book isn't written only for them. In other words, let's say you don't give a fig about jazz--say you couldn't tell the Bird from Benny Goodman. That's no problem: every time he uses an example from jazz to illustrate a point, he uses a famous rock example as well. If you don't get the jazz one, you'll probably get the Rolling Stones reference. I would think everyone could live with that.

Or, let's say you are not at all interested in knowing why Joni Mitchell prefers a certain bass player. You only want to read about the neurology. Or vice-versa: all that neurology stuff is boring; you want to know more about what Neil Young thinks about music.

Unfortunately, there's a little of everything in here. Good solid multi-disciplinary science (neurology, genetics, evolutionary biology); a nice thorough introduction to music theory (explaining terms like pitch, octave, scale, dissonance, beat, timbre); anecdotes from his personal musical experience (what Joni Mitchell told him about her favorite bass player, why he didn't get to take guitar lessons when he was a kid).

UN - fortunately?

Well, I loved this book. I learned a lot about music (in general, as well as specific genres), a little about neurology and evolution, a little about various musicians. I couldn't have been more pleased.

The only reason I can find that anyone didn't enjoy the book is that they didn't want to read about all that other stuff (whatever was not the thing they did want to read about). If you can overlook that, of if you look forward to all of it, I guarantee this book will prove an entertaining, enlightening experience.

The one caveat I have is that, if you really do not know anything about music, pay good attention in the opening chapters when he introduces concepts like chord and scale. Or, be prepared to go back and reference those chapters. I do not see how a detailed book about music could avoid this situation (he cannot talk about music without talking about rythyms, melodies and harmonies). But he does a very good job of introducing and explaining them.

So, enjoy!

For musicians of any genre, any level of involvement, who wonder how they do what they do and why they can sing their favorite song on pitch and in tempo even if they can't sing, this book is a fascinating read. Oh, if you wonder why that stupid ad jingle just won't get out of your head, find out here!

You have to have enjoyed your science classes in school, but you will find out why you have this obsession with making music. Levitin is eclectic in his definition of music and uses examples from Bach to Led Zeppelin and beyond. He was a rock musician and producer before he became a scientist.

The book is dense, a few pages will provide food for thought for a week, but if science and music are part of your life this book will be on the hot shelf for months.

J'Carlin

THIS IS YOUR BRAIN ON MUSIC could have been featured in our Health Shelf section, but is reviewed here for its importance to musicians and any interested in music. It's the first to provide a comprehensive scientific analysis of how people experience music: chapters blend psychology, neuroscience, and musical examples from classical to rap to explain different facets of music and how they are perceived by the brain. Lest you think this overly scientific, it also provides many links between these functions and composer effectiveness and strategy.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

As a person who had given up on ever understanding music, and as an aficionado of books on cognitive neuroscience (Pinker, Hofstadter, Sacks, et al), I felt a certain obligation to read this book, but no real enthusiasm.

It is easily one of the ten most important books I have read. Thoroughly enjoyable, referencing every genre from rap to rock to classical, accessible (to use an overworked word). Even if you know nothing about music at all, there is a good chance that you will find this book hard to put down. His arguments for music being a fundamentally important activity for us humans are compelling.

Although it becomes apparent that there is a bit of, umm, tension and disagrement between Levitin and my very favorite author, Steven Pinker, this only serves to make one pay even more attention.

W. L. Prichard, Jr. MD

Daniel J. Levitin understands the connection between rhythm (and consequently music) and the genetic human drive to belong to the group through emulation. How better can we move together that with a beat? When do we feel closer that sharing a music experience where we can move together? It sounds simple when said, but how many understand enough to say it? A landmark book.

This is a very approachable book that will appeal to anyone who wonders why we all find music so compelling. It summarizes our best understanding of the physics, as well as anatomical and physiologic basis of our ability to feel and make music. Sophisticated concepts of mind-brain interaction are presented with reference to popular music, and simple occasionally comical models. It's an easy read that will make you smarter. Recommended for musicians, teachers, scientists and thinking people in general.

Love music, science. iconoclastic humor, and hate pretension? - - then this is the book for you! One suggestion: As I was reading the first two chapters, several times I thought to myself: "This is terrific, but it would be even better if it was on tape and that when in his discussion he explained a musical concept and made reference to a familiar musical work you would quickly hear a portion of it as an illustrative example!" Well, that is exactly what you can find at the following website:

www.YourBrainOnMusic.com

I highly recommend that one have this site up on their computer screen as they read the book.

I found this book interesting, thought-provoking, and intriguing, although I am not completely sure what it was about. Music has long been my main interest and passion, while cognitive science is an intriguing topic that has long been at the top of my reading list. Thus, as soon as I saw this book, I had to have it. I have wondered for many years about the philosophical questions of music: WHY we love music, where music came from and if it's something we need to do or just like to do, and most of all: whether music provides a portal into some universal truth or form of beauty beyond the human experience, or, rather, is just an outcome of human cognitive organization and is seemingly beautiful only because we, who invented it, would tend to enjoy something that fits so naturally with our own cognitive design and taps into our evolutionarily-determined tastes. These questions, which have been percolating in my head for many years, have been addressed elsewhere in bits and pieces, but never as a total area of inquiry for an entire book. So how'd the author do?

Levitin raises and writes about a huge number of speculative and intriguing questions. Some of these pertain specifically to music, but others are actually broader examinations of cognition and human awareness - topics like how the mind groups and categorizes things to understand the world-out-there. I actually really enjoyed the broad, cognitive science aspect of the book. Having read all of Steven Pinker's, Gazzaniga's and others cognitive scientists' books, I have to say the material pertaining to brains in this book is not highly original, and is more of a summary of others' ideas than a source of ground-breaking new ideas. But that's fine. This, after all, is a book of applied cognitive science (applied to music, that is), not pure ground-breaking cognitive science. You could reasonably call this book "Steven Pinker Lite on Music" - it has much of Pinker's wit, and even more flair than the flair-ful Pinker for communicating dense ideas clearly and entertainingly. (Not that he and Pinker would agree on music and brain evolution; they wouldn't, but that's beyond the scope of this review).

I found the book easy to follow. It opens with kind of a primer on music theory. The only challenge here is that even with this primer, I don't know if the book would be easily accessible (or of much interest) to the non-musician. Levitin does about as good a job as can be done breaking down a technically complex area such as music into laymen's terms, but in the end, if you don't know what a scale is, or can't at least noodle on a piano or guitar, you are going to struggle with this book. As the book progresses beyond the initial primer stage, it gets into some very interesting questions about how the mind processes music, whether (and how) emotions are attached to music, etc. At no point did I feel lost or overwhelmed; Levitin is a gifted writer in terms of breaking down complex topics for a generalist audience.

My absolute favorite part of the book is toward the end, when he addresses why people get locked in to a certain style or type of music from their teen years. I have wondered about this for many years, first when my dad made me listen to those awful old ragtime recordings, and more recently as I've realized that Zeppelin is not in fact the universal timeless answer to perfection in music, but rather, a taste I picked up in junior hi, and not one that today's 50-Cent fans share. It really does seem that people pick up a certain musical taste in their early teen years and stick with it, even as the next generation gets into entirely different sounds that are very hard for one to later adapt to and enjoy. Why that is, and specifically what happens on a cognitive level to cause that, is a fascinating question. I don't think this book fully resolves it, but he does explore the issue, and I haven't seen it explored elsewhere.

My only criticism of the book is that, a couple hundred pages later, I'm not exactly sure what the book is about. Something to do with the intersection of music and cognition, but beyond that, it's fuzzy. There is no singular question that gets answered, or main hypothesis that is tested and refined, and in fact, some of the key questions about music, beauty, and minds that drove me to buy the book, and have driven the author to write it, do not really get answered. Very ambitious, broad-themed books do tend to have this problem. The book is a bit of a stream of consciousness project from a guy who is an excellent writer and deeply interested in music, minds, and many other interesting topics. Levitin has real philosophical depth, as evident both in the topics explored, as well as very clever metaphors, examples, and analogies. He makes his journey through music and cognition a thoroughly enjoyable read, but it is an unfocused one. Perhaps a bit more editing, or an editor who was a bit more insistent about the age-old question "What is your essential message or point?" would've helped, but I still give this book an A, just not an A+. Of all the topics to speculate on in perhaps a somewhat unfocused manner, music and brains are actually pretty good ones. I would recommend this book, as long as you have at least a minimal background in music. Just keep in mind, you are not getting a powerpoint presentation of well-organized bullet points about cognitive science here; you're getting a lengthy musing on minds and music from an interesting guy with a lot of cool anecdotes and, I have to say this again, really great examples and metaphors to explain complex ideas in fun and interesting ways. What you are not getting is a concrete answer to the seminal questions of music philosophy, "Why do we make music" and "Why do we think Mozart's music is beautiful". Maybe in his next book...which I would eagerly buy and read.

P.S. Like another reviewer below, I was thoroughly intrigued by the author's argument that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to become great at something, no matter what it is - music, arts, business, whatever. So simple, and yet profoundly true to my own life experiences.

Daniel Levitin, professional musician and sound engineer turned neuroscientist, is uniquely equipped to write this fascinating, entertaining, enlightening exploration of the human mind and the human-created experience that is music. This is a must-read, must-have for every music student, music teacher, and composer, and a wonderfully readable guided tour through the creative and neurological workings of the human mind. Levitin's love for music illuminates each page, and he effortlessly interweaves brain-scan findings with a line-by-line lyrical breakdown that explains exactly why 'JailHouse Rock" rocks. His diagrams and explanations of which different areas of the brain are engaged by specific musical instruments are worth the price alone. The perfect gift book, no prior musical education required. Levitin is a wonderfully engaging and consciousness-expanding writer; start even a quick skim and you'll find yourself drawn along, ultimately experiencing music in a whole new way. For educators considering this book for students, I'll say Levitin has created a rare achievement: a well documented, thoroughly footnoted and seminal text which is such a great read it's almost impossible to put down.

There is enough self-indulgent auto-biographical dribble in this book to ruin whatever interest the reader might have had for brain science. If you want to learn about how the mind works there are many excellent popular brain science books, stay away from this book. If you want to learn about the musical tastes of Daniel J. Levitin and how important his friends are, this is the book for you. Barely tolerable.

Interesting book, but I think the author needs to be challenged on one important point.
Famous doctor and neurologist Oliver Sacks is quoted, on both sides of the book's jacket cover, as having "liked the discussion of 'safe' and 'dangerous' music".

On the topic of "safety" in music, here is what Daniel Levitin writes:

"Safety plays a role for a lot of us in choosing music. To a certain extent, we surrender to music when we listen to it - we allow ourselves to trust the composer and musicians with a part of our hearts and our spirits; we let the music take us somewhere outside of ourselves.
Many of us feel that great music connects us to something larger than our own existence, to other people, or to God. Even when music doesn't transport us to an emotional place that is transcendent, music can chnage our mood. We might be understandably reluctant, then, to let down our guard, to drop our emotional defenses, for just anyone. We will do so if the musicians and composer make us feel safe. We want to know that our vulnerability is not going to be exploited.
This is part of the reason whay so many people can't listen to Wagner.
Due to his pernicious anti-Semitism, the sheer vulgarity of his mind (as Oliver Sacks describes it), and his music's association with the Nazi regime, some people don't feel safe listening to his music.
Wagner has always disturbed me profoundly, and not just his music, but also the idea of listening to it.
I feel reluctant to give into the seduction of music created by so disturbed a mind and so dangerous (and impenetrably hard) a heart as his, for fear that I might develop some of the same ugly thoughts.
When I listen to the music of a great composer I feel that I am, in some sense, becoming one with him, or letting a part of him inside me.
I also find this disturbing with popular music, because surely some of the purveyors of pop are crude, sexist, racist, or all three."
(pages 236-237)

I wonder what are the scientific foundations for Dr.Sack's comment on Wagner's mind and Daniel Levitin's agreement with such a dubious proposition.

I believe "why SOME people can't listen to Wagner" would be the appropriate way of formulating it. In the book, page 237, he says "why SO MANY people", and I think it overstates the case.
I was not convinced by his argument of linking Wagner's anti-Semitism etc. with the "safety" of listening to his music.
Here in Paris, I do seminars for executives using musical pedagogies. Look at [...]
The Wagner comment reminded me of a listening exercice I did recently with different versions of the overture to Beethoven's Fifth Symphony.
One of the versions was recorded in Berlin during the war, in 1943, conducted by Wilhelm Furtwängler. One participant came to me after the seminar and told me he was very emotive about having liked what he heard. He said it troubled him to like such a piece played, as he put it, in front of Nazis etc. I discussed this with him, showing him pictures of the concert supplied in the CD box and it appeared there were no Nazis to be seen.
I think it shows the importance of mental pre-construction in appreciating art, music.
Maybe it is what SOME people have with Wagner.
But remember... Wagner was long dead by the time Hitler and the Nazis ruled Germany.
Also I am wondering what is the source of Oliver Sack's comment saying that Wagner was a mind of "sheer vulgarity".
I doubt very much such great conductors playing Wagner regularly as Daniel Barenboim or Pierre Boulez, one of the most important contemporary music composer which has conducted Wagner's Ring cycle at Bayreuth, would agree with this comment...
The author should warn Québécois genius Robert Lepage who will soon stage Wagners' complete Ring opera cycle at New York's Metropolitan Opera (maybe the management of this famous opera house needs to be warned too!).

This is very well-written ... the science is clear and easily grasped; the music is familiar and engaging; the lessons quickly absorbed. I heartily recommend "This Is Your Brain on Music" to scientists, musicians and everyone in between ... but especially to those who control the arts budgets of school districts and cities, the better to understand the damage that cuts do.

Daniel Levitin knows the world of music from many sides. He started out as a musician, but then studied Neuroscience where he has made a distinguished career. This book is the product of his varied experience and learning. It is an exciting exploration of a world of activity almost all of us in one way or another relate to, and receive great pleasure from.
Levitin explains what he aims to do in his introductory chapter.
"
This book is about the science of music, from the perspective of cognitive neuroscience - the field that is at the intersection of psychology and neurology. I'll discuss some of my own and the latest studies researchers in our field have conducted on music, musical meaning, and musical pleasure. They offer new insights into profound questions. If all of us hear music differently, how can we account for pieces that seem to move so many people - Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, or Don McLean's "Vincent (Starry Starry Night (Vincent)" for example? On the other hand, if we all hear music in the same way, how can we account for wide differences in musical preference - why is it that one man's Mozart is another man's Madonna? "

In nine brilliant chapters he studies music from a number of different points- of - view.

The chapters are:
Introduction: I love music and I love science. Why would I want to mix the two?
1) What is Music? From Pitch to Timbre
2) Foot tappin. Concerning Rhythm, Loudness and Harmony
3)Behind the Curtain Music and the Mind- Machine
4) Anticipation
5) You know my name, look up the number. How we categorize Music
6)After dessert Crick was still four seats from me .Musical emotion and the reptilian brain
7) What makes a musician Expertise
8) My favorite things Why do we like the music we like
9) The music instinct Exolution's Number One Hit

The book's opening chapter provides a rich technical analysis of music listening. Its final chapter focuses on 'evolutionary pyschology' and the question of musical origins. Is music's origin in the cry of the courting male to his beloved? and vice- versa? Or is it more likely in the social binding it provides to lone individuals, the communal chorus which unites in our hymns, anthems, singalongs, ? In this regard Levitin points out that the way we experience music today, by and large as listeners to the 'experts' the 'performers' is far different from mankind's experience through most of our history when music truly was a communal activity?
What Levitin clearly denies is the claim of Steven Pinker that our music making and music appreciation are somehow secondary to more primal and important linguistic or mathematical skills? For Levitin our experience of music is an appetite and pleasure as deep in us as hungers for food and sex. He points out too its universal quality in seeming to touch all cultures. It too touches all stages of our life, and as his own researches show all areas of our brain, not being confined to one lobe only.
While it is not guaranteed that the reader of this book will come to finally understand how and why Music is made and appreciated, they will certainly better understand this than they have before
Oh why I wonder when I sing to myself do I feel such a great great happiness when I do not have a particularly good voice?

As a leading researcher in the field, Levitin supplies many interesting facts. Overall, though, I found the book a chore to get through. As a musician with a greater-than-average interest in science, my eyes glazed over at all the brain anatomy details. They would have been OK if the book had been better organized, but it was divided into a small handful of rambling chapters.

Some important topics were not addressed at all. After defining absolute ("perfect") pitch, he digresses immediately to a discussion of his research demonstrating that most people have the ability to remember a song in its original key, never to return to absolute pitch, surely a major topic in the neurology of music.

The musical examples are mainly from 1980s pop music; if unfamiliar with or don't like that genre, you will be left scratching your head much of the time.

The concluding chapter concerns whether music served an evolutionary purpose, or instead came along as a side benefit of something else. The author argues for the former, speculating that, like a peacock's tail feathers, being a good musician made one a desirable mate. He may or may not be right, but his arguments range from unconvincing to ludicrous: he points out that Jimi Hendrix got lots of women, as does Mick Jagger, who in fact does so in spite of being unattractive!

Read Oliver Sacks's "Musicophilia" instead. A far more interesting book by a much better writer.

The author provides an excellent introduction to music theory as well the sensory affects it has on the brain.
The author personalizes his findings from his experiences allowing the reader to have a more comfort level with his technical presentation. His stepwise development also allows the reader not to become overwhelmed with technical jargon. For me it's a slow read but worthwhile to ponder its implications.

This book blends fascinating ideas about the workings of the mind and brain with an array of practical knowledge about music making. The result is an accessible read that sheds light upon one of the most fundamental and widespread of human behaviors.

And fails. Two main problems:

1) Levitin can't write worth a darn: inelegant, disorganized (both on the larger scale and in things like dividing his prose into paragraphs) and sloppy. I keep hearing about how the publishing industry has largely stopped editing books and I think this is a case in point. Simply editing and asking for re-writes might have substantially improved Levitin's lazy effort. The author also name-drops like crazy, plopping in the names (and university affiliations - like who cares?) of his scientific researchers for no reason frequently throughout the book. This is a popularization of a scientific field so of course researchers conducting studies on specific subjects should be discussed. But Levitin instead swerves from one (vapid) anecdote to another with no structure or objective in sight and no organized discussion of a particular researcher or research school's motivating idea or aim. The most painful example of these instances is his lunch with Francis Crick - the point of that extended anecdote seems to be that Levitin met a world-famous scientist. Good for you, Dan.

2) I would conclude from this book that psychological research into musical perception has yielded no interesting results, not even any moderately interesting ones. Now "Your brain on music" occasionally perked my interest here and there. But on those occasions, Levitin doesn't explain research results and instead makes critical observations about music that aren't reliant on psychology. I'm frankly not sure whether music psychology deserves better than this - maybe it has yielded fascinating insights into the mind. But you wouldn't know it from this work.

Poor content, poor style, poor effort.

I became very interested in Levitin's research after reading an article in Rolling Stone. That a plug for the book appeared in that particular magazine should have clued me in to its nature.

In any case, the book IS a decent primer for those without formal musical background... However, as a work discussing the neuroscience of music, it's definitely tedious and rambling. Nearly the first half of the work concerns itself with introducing those not familiar with music to basic structural concepts, as well as his own mini-autobiography. All of this would be fine, but this leaves only about 125 pages for the discussion of brain functions. Of the 320 pages, about 70 are Appendices and End Notes, 125 are Music Theory 101/Levitin's Name-Dropping 101, and 125 for the actual science. That's only 40% of the book dealing with the neuroscience of music. There are better works out there covering the same material.

Daniel Levitin's book contains a wealth of interesting information geared towards lovers of music who also have a curiosity about how music affects and is interpreted by your brain. The two topics, music and the brain, initially are discussed in a text-book fashion to ensure the reader is up to speed in both. For music, there is crash course on theory; for the brain, a crash course on its neural network. Both are interesting, though at times a bit dry. When the two are fused, the writing, while often wandering and weighted by anecdotes, is full of the writer's passion for both. Some reviewers accuse Levitin of name-dropping and self aggrandizement, of which I found very little. To me he comes across as a writer who genuinely loves music, those who make it, and those who study it from a scientific perspective.

I am a huge music lover and I was hoping this book would help me understand why I like some music and not other music, and Levitin provides a convincing answer. He also, contrary to at least one other reviewer, answers the question of why songs get stuck in one's head and why some songs stand the test of time while others fade away.

While the content of the book is what I was looking for, the writing on occasion seems to stagnate or be disjointed. Short stories from the author's experiences are scattered throughout the book with enjoyable humor and wit, but they have a tendency to interrupt a topic or point. By the time the anecdote is complete the reader may have to stop for a moment to recall how the story is relevant to the current topic. This at times stagnates the writing and at others makes the writing feel disjointed. At other times the anecdotes fit in just fine. Also, some points are made more than once at various times in the book, again, lending to a feeling of disjointedness, or wordiness.

To his credit, Levitin does not have a snob mentality that might proclaim only Mozart or Coltrane to be "good" music. Example songs to prove his points are culled from an impressively wide array of well known music from classic rock to jazz to classical to blues to punk to hip hop to metal and more. Most every reader should be familiar with a large number of them, which makes the book fun to read and Levitin's points easy to understand. He also does an admirable job of not dismissing any genre or artist as being less worthy than another. Bravo.

In all, a satisfying read with a wealth of interesting information, such as in the final chapter where Levitin covers the question of music and evolution, which is an example of something I didn't expect to learn about but found fascinating. Perhaps a better editor would have made this a four or five star book.

This book is a fascinating and absolutely delightful read. Moreover, it is a great conversation starter. As a frequent traveler I have read a lot of books in the airport and on airplanes, but never has a book created so much interest from people sitting near me. I even had a fellow passenger sneak it off my lap when I was dozing (not while reading).

There's an old cliche: 'Music has the power to calm the savage beast.' Even in Harry Potter, Fluffy, the three headed dog guarding the Chamber of Secrets is calmed down, indeed put to sleep by music. Why does music affect us this way? Indeed, why does it affect us at all?

This book attempts to explain the answers to these and other questions regarding how we hear music, how music goes beyond mere sound to be something that affects our perception of the world.

Dr. Levitin is a neuroscientist with a history of work in the musical industry including performing, sound engineer and record producer. His work seeks to explain what is happening inside your head when you hear music.

I find myself wondering what happens in the mind of people who don't have an ear for music. General Grant, for instance, is quoted as saying: 'I recognize two songs, one is Yankee Doodle and the other one isn't.'

It's fascinating reading about a subject little studied for being such a major part of our lives.

A book for all humans who love music, are influenced by music, can't live without music. Now you understand why it makes you feel the way you do when you are "under its influence". A book for humans who have never explored the subject of music as it can be viewed as the "Universal Language". A must read!

This book is a perfect marriage of art and science. Love it!

What a wonderful book. I have worked for a number of years trying to understand music - not just what I like but how to tell others what I like and why I like it. I now have the vocabulary to be able to say what I like about a bit of music and why I like it. I have had so many `aha' moments while reading the book I have lost count. I have recommended the book This Is Your Brain on Music to all who I know that love music - even the ones with music degrees and play music for a living. If you love (even just like) music this is a book you should not pass up. If you only buy one book this is the one on which to spend your money.

This is a sensitive and comprehensive exploration of how we listen to and process music. Dr. Levitin's writing style makes complex concepts easy to grasp, using fun and familiar examples to explore the intricate workings of our brain.
Having read a number of other books on the physics of music and the basics of hearing, this book ties up the "music package" beautifully.
A fast, fascinating and fully accessible, great read!

Like many of the negative reviewers, I found that *This Is Your Brain on Music* didn't enhance either my knowledge of music or of cognitive science. It's not without any substance, but that substance has been spread pretty thinly, and it offers one of the weakest evolutionary explanations for music as a human phenomenon: it demonstrates fitness because it indicates abundant amounts of free time. Perhaps this is true of the drive to perform, but what about the millions of people addicted to listening to music? Isn't music in some way *special* ? No one gets a painting "stuck in their head" for days as happens with music, and there doesn't seem to be a visual corollary to those stroke victims who can no longer speak--but who can still sing. To be sure, Levitin doesn't seem particularly interested in this, but this is part of the problem with the book. I also have to agree with reviewers that felt the book was disorganized and not compellingly written, but I never found Levitin to be particularly egocentric--I think he's making the case that he's well-qualified to discuss both the brain and music. Unfortunately, he doesn't convincingly do either, and the book's most memorable element is probably the title.

As a musician I find this topic fascinating. The book does cover many interesting points and brings up ideas about how and why we react to music in the ways that we do. However, the authors errors in analyzing some of the music examples and forms throughout the book are flawed and drive someone like me nuts. If the author isn't an educated musician he should have spent more time with musicians researching some of the technical details of the music he examined. The book might try too hard to be all things to all people, and satisfies none. Too technical for the non-scientist, not technical enough for scientists, to musical for non-musicians, not deep enough for musicians.

Daniel J. Levitin's "This Is Your Brain on Music" is a book that combines an interest in music with an interest in the brain, the mind, and how they work together. It wasn't written with his scientific colleagues in mind, nor was it written for musicians with advanced concepts of harmony, but anyone with an interest in music and the mind can benefit. He kind of renders unto Caesar what is Caesar's as it were, but I imagine his fellow scientists would think he had oversimplified some of the science, just as I did with the rudimentary musical explanations.

I kind of skimmed over parts that explained things I already knew about chords, scales and keys. But he did a pretty good job. I think you can't really explain music like that with just words, but if you explore harmony with a piano or guitar, and then read about the theory, you will start to see how certain chords almost have gravitational fields that pull them towards resolutions with other chords. At one point, in the appendix, Levitin prints the chords to I Got Rhythm by George Gershwin, but for an AABA form song, he only prints the chords to the first two A parts, and leaves out the B section, which is what really made the song such a perennial favorite of jammers. Also, he transposes them to the key of C, while "Rhythm" is more often played in Bb. For the musician who wants to understand music theory I recommend The Jazz Theory Book by Mark Levine or The Jazz Piano Book, also by Mark Levine.

But TIYBOM is THE book to read if you want to take a layman's tour of the latest scientific theories about how the brain and mind function in performing or listening to music. He describes fascinating experiments with EEG, electroencephalogram, which monitors the electrical activity triggered by musical, or other, thoughts. To further refine the process, they use functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging, or fMRI, which not only monitors the electrical activity, but can pinpoint the exact location by tracking oxygenated hemoglobin which flow into the regions where the synapses are firing. Though Levitin was biased against mapping the brain for its own sake, the mapping did provide insight into how musical thoughts were processed. For instance, the hippocampus, not a college for hippopotami, but rather a part of the brain, seems to be involved in musical memories, experiences and context. The left and right hemispheres have different functions, but how this differs in left and right handed individuals is still being studied. The cerebellum, the most primitive part of the brain, one that is present in reptiles, also seems to have a role in rhythm, rhythmic motor functions, such as walking, and emotions. Perhaps emotions are triggered by music, completely bypassing the later more evolved portions of the brain, and going straight to the cerebellum. Like the snake charmer with a basket of cobras, except that cobras are deaf and it is a trick, involving kicking the basket, and then swaying to distract the snakes.

There are lots of interesting stor