Music and Language and Emotions and the Brain

The other day I had a chance to sit for a while when things were quiet and listen to this radio program from WYNC's Radio Lab. It was a very interesting and even entertaining program. I really do want to know more about how the ear "hears"...how our brains get the message!

Really it was so fascinating that I listened twice to the segments about how babies are attuned to pitches as infants and how in societies with tonal languages (languages like Mandarin Chinese) it is more likely a child will grow up with perfect pitch compared to a language (like English) which is not tone specific. (Many many great composers had perfect pitch.) But that we do teach babies certain vocal inflections as part of communication and some of that is common around the world.

Also I enjoyed the segment about Stravinsky's Rite of Spring which some call the most important music written in the last century. I followed up the radio program by listening to my daughter's orchestra at the Conservatory at Lawrence University as they played a fantastic concert of mostly Stravinsky pieces!
A great evening!

(This picture is actually from the November concert with the LSO choirs. Also a really great concert.)