en se frottant au piano nostalgique
Oliver Sacks, the sooper-dooper famous neurologist—you know, the guy from Awakenings—has written a new book on music and the brain, called Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain. It will be published in October.
As you might have guessed from my past posts on this blog, the topic of music and the brain is right up my alley. I am pre-ordering right now, I mean, now, now, typing now…
The July 23, 2007 issue of The New Yorker has a short preview piece called “A Bolt from the Blue.” Sacks introduces some of the patients that he will feature in the book. One patient is an orthopedic surgeon who was struck by lightning and then developed “an insatiable desire to listen to piano music.” He never had been particularly interested in piano music and had taken only a few lessons when he was young. Beyond the desire to listen to music, he taught himself to play the piano and now composes piano music. A scientific man by trade, he explains his new musical interests as part of a spirituality he developed after the lightning strike.
Another patient, a reserved and tidy pharmacist, underwent brain surgery and emerged, according to her husband, “a joyologist.” She is now cheerful, warm, interactive with her co-workers, and completely addicted to music.
Sacks says [these patients] showed “a drastic transformation from being only vaguely interested in music to being passionately excited by it and in continual need of it. And with both of them there were other, more general changes, too—a surge of emotionality, as if emotions of every sort were being stimulated or released.”
A third patient with temporal lobe epilepsy started taking an anticonvulsant, Lamotrigine, and developed “sudden musicophilia” even though most of her adult life she was bored by music and even at times found it annoying.
Sacks makes some tentative explanations of musicophilia—enhanced neural connections between the temporal lobe (perception) and parts of the limbic system (emotional response)—but he indicates that there is much science cannot explain about the brain’s response to music.
There’s a short interview with Oliver Sacks about this subject here. The mp3 is worth a listen, even just to hear the music of his spoken English.
Kinda makes you want to stand outside in a thunderstorm…
categories: music, thought
tags: music and the brain, musicophilia, Oliver Sachs
posted by guinness at 01:00 am
Oh, so that’s what happened to some of us with Taylor Hicks: sudden musicophilia! Seems a little less painful than being hit by lightning!
Wow. That sounds like a great read. I’m trying to start reading more, again. I’ve pulled out a couple old books that I treasure. But I’ve been thinking I need something new. That’s one to look forward to. Non-fiction’s my thing.
I think I’ll stop at a bookstore on my way home today and see if something strikes me.
That is definately what has happened to me since finding Taylor -a drastic transformation from being only vaguely interested in music to NEEDING it in my life and thinking about it all the time when I am not listening. Taylor is a big part of what I listen to but it has expanded to being curious about any music and I am on a musical journey.
The funny part is I just can’t understand why everyone doesn’t love music like I do. And I can’t help my obsession - I often stop midsentence to listen to music in the background.
When I’m in the car and I hear a song on the radio that I like, I will pull over to the side of the road and wait for the DJ to give the title/artist so I can jot it down. Nothing new, have always been that way. How sick is that?
My beloved younger brother made the strange life choice of frying his brains with alcohol. He has lost all short term memory, cannot do the simpliest of every day tasks, and lives in assisted living. Last summer, I took him to visit some friends in an old house in the French country side. As i woke up one morning, I heard beautiful music wafting up to the little attic room I was staying in. I went downstairs to see which cd was playing, but it was actually my brother playing the piano. I stood quietly in the doorway, just listening. At some point, he became aware of my presence and started a wonderful improvisation on the American anthem. For a little, I felt like I had my brother back. Then he stopped playing and went back to being the shadow of the brilliant man he used to be. So in his case, he did not find the music, music is one of the few things that his brain was able to retain.
And on the same topic of people who destroy their lives, and given the title of this poat, go see La Vie en Rose if you can. Good movie!
Been a known scientific”fact” for some time that there is a music “spot” on/in the brain…. presupposing that we have a brain with which to musically “spot-check”.
I was not blessed: when born, I must have been quoting Shakespeare,” Out, Out damn spot. ” and it left.
this is some seriously interesting shit. i’m too busy at present but i want to think about this later. however i will say there are a lot of moments in life that are like “lighting strikes” that set off something which unleashes some kind of awesomeness.
Saw a review of this book, guiness and instantly thought of you. I wonder if the trigger works in reverse, like aphasia does to language. Can an injury or psychic trauma rob you of your musical ability? Not just interest, but can it make you musicaly dumb, so to speak?
If you can’t use your musical ability due to an injury or trauma, how would you know if you had lost that ability or not? There would be no point of reference ???
Point of reference would be the ability as expressed prior to injury. For example, it’s not unusual for singers to injure vocal chords and it’s very obvious that it interferes with their singing. So if instead they injured their brain in the area talked about in his book, wouldn’t that have an effect on some part of their ability?
If you damage the right hemisphere of your brain it is possible to lose some musical abilities.
I live with someone with a traumatic brain injury (tbi), so I find all this brain stuff very interesting. While researching these topics I found many articles about the use of music therapy in rehabilitation programs for people with tbi, like this one that I found very interesting:
http://www.northeastcenter.com/music_therapy_at_northeast_center.htm
And that makes me think of my work with some of my more challenging students (I’m an aide). I had one student who was just bouncing off the walls and talking a mile a minute, every day, all day. He absolutely could not control himself. He disrupted every class he was in and could not complete any work. The other students did not like him. My heart was pained watching him struggle just to sit for 40 minutes. It looked like his head was going to explode from the effort, and he was never successful. Then one day, I don’t know why, I told him he could listen to his CD player with headphones. It was MAGIC. As soon as he put that music on, he proceeded to sit quietly for 45 minutes and complete several days’ worth of work. Take THAT ritalin!!
Now, if I were to put on some music and try to study it would never work. I would be completely distracted by the music. But for him, it was like magic. I don’t know how I got this far off on a tangent. I just think the different ways our brains work is so interesting…
If you injure the brain , your mind function and bodily functions will also be affected to some extent depending on the injury. If the damage is neurological, recovery is determined by how much the nerves can reestablish their original function. ( All this is still being researched ) Musicians appear to have additional specializations, particularly hyperdevelopment of some brain structures in the temporal lobe. But there is a difference between musical appreciation ( emotional ) and musical ability ( practicality ) The degree to which an injury has damaged the neurological connections/tissue will determine the degree to which a person’s abilities suffer.
If a person had a great musical talent prior to an injury, it could conceivably disappear . ( or would it still be there but just not be apparent because you can’t demonstrate it’s presence - a philosophical approach to the question ).
Gosh , this is a complicated issue, isn’t it? I’m out of my element here.
Another good book on the subject:
http://www.yourbrainonmusic.com/
I know I will love this book. Oliver Sacks is a favorite of mine. Some of the cases in Anthropologist on Mars will haunt me forever. I have seen music as a healing tool. I have seen it used powerfully with hyperactive kids and deeply depressed patients in a nursing home. Thanks for another blockbuster topic Guinness!!!
I’ve been very busy lately so I have been reading our blog more than posting. I can’t tell Mamaforpeace just how moved I was by your account of your brother. I cried! I had one friend who had had a psychotic break. The doctors gave him little hope of rejoining society. He was in our band. We pushed a piano into his room. Later that night a person was screaming in the next bed. Our friend amazed everyone by going over and beginning to play a lullaby. He played until the other patient grew calm and even came over to the piano. In the weeks that followed our dear friend played his way back to lucidity. In the final week he was there he would play in the common area for hours and hours entertaining the other patients. That story had such a joyous ending. He was released — toured played music-married — has kids. The fix worked. Another member was not as lucky. It was our lead guitar player. He took some bad LSD and it broke his mind- is tormented brilliant mind. The only thing that remained was his music. I recall watching him play and thinking that all the turbulence was gone and he had been left with the cleanest part of himself.
Anyway—-your words about your brother moved me so much that it was part of why I chose to post the topic I wrote for today. Thanks to everyone in this thread of comments.
Ha, Meg! When I read your post this morning, it actually did make me think about my brother. He somehow felt that he needed to alter his perceptions to the point of suffering to enhance his creativity. He started on this road after reading Malcom Lowry’s “Under the Volcano”, though, in truth, I think this was a path that was almost inevitable for him. He was always ultra sensitive, une sensibilite “a fleur de peau” (right under the skin). He told me once that he felt he had “cancer of the soul”.
Cancer of the soul — wow Mamaforpeace — how painful those words are. I hope that for all that the booze took from your brother that it left him with peaceful days that he can enjoy albethey different from your heart’s desire. I also wanted to thank you for suggesting La Vie en Rose to those who read this blog. A very dear friend of mine sent me a tape of that film a few years back and I agree that it is one of power — and eye opening courage.
Yes, meg, you are right. My brother is much more at peace now, he does not remember who he used to be, and that is a blessing. In some ways, it is easier for me as well now than during the long descent into hell that he went through. It’s done now… before, there was hope.
The movie La Vie en Rose that I was talking about is the movie that came out recently. There must be an older one I was not aware of.