camille mapua

CGSC485: HW#1

Musical Minds follows the patients studied by Oliver Sacks in his research regarding

the therapeutic effects of music. The program investigates four individuals whose lives are

deeply entwined in music. Derek, a pianist who is blind and autistic, reveals the mysteries of

non-neurotypical responses to music; although he is unable to process concepts generally

perceived as rudimentary such as counting, his incredible musical abilities are unmatched,

particularly his musical memory and reproduction. Sacks also worked with Matt, a drum player

with Tourettes. Matts tics are frequent and involuntary, except when he is drumming. He

describes the calm as the puzzle in his brain clicking together, two hemispheres balanced in

rhythm with the music. Anne is the anomaly of the group; a patient with amusia, she is deaf to

fundamental aspects of music, despite being raised in a family of Irish instrument makers. She is

unable to distinguish differences and similarities in melodic sequences. Lastly, the program

follows the story of Tony, an orthopedic surgeon who became a musician after being struck by a

bolt of lightning.

The documentary discusses Sackss conceptual investigations as well; Sacks describes

music as evocative yet is unable to further express the emotions extracted by an introspective

experience. Then, reporter Alan Yentob presents the question: what came first: music or

language? Sacks provides a comprehensive review of the perception of music as a uniquely

species-produced phenomenon of culture, highlighting its shared central role with language. He

shares his own anecdotes about growing up in a house full of music; his father had a strong

musical memory (though not nearly as complex as Dereks) and could often recall entire

symphonies, hearing individual instruments simultaneously. This aspect was particularly

interesting to me since I have been in search of theories investigating the absolute pitch I
developed in my childhood. Sackss studies in musical hallucinosis prompt me to wonder if the

two phenomena are related neurologically. I was surprised he did not expand upon this

phenomenon more in his investigations.

Patel takes an anthropological approach. His analysis of the purposes for which birds use

music distinguish their neurobiological nature. The variety of the purposes, styles, and

spontaneity of human music are highlighted in his talk, most notably the vegetable symphony.

The structure of music is then detailed. Unique to human music is the complex organization

system of assigning pitches and rhythms. Patel presents the most widely known system, that of

the Western world, involving echoes of mathematics theories that result in a twelve-tone palette

of pitches. The most notable feature of this system is the concept of keys which Patel

demonstrates in his piano samples.

An intuition about music is addressed throughout the talk. Patel rightly assumes that his

audience can anticipate progressions and can predict members of keys; this universal

acceptability judgement strengthens his assertion. He presents the circle of fifths, a progression

that follows the dominant chords after a given key until all keys of the chromatic scale are

included. Patel describes this familiarity as implicit knowledge, a component of the musical

grammar. However, this statement elicits questions from my own study of music and language:

is chord progression synonymous to the syntax well-studied in language? A chord progression

can sound wrong or ungrammatical, yet this determination is often prescriptively determined.

Music has artistic freedom so that nothing created is ever truly wrong, just atypical.

Patel compares elements of music and language, initially detailing the differences

between the two mediums. There is a particular word/chord order assigned to a sentence/phrase,

yet individuals who have aphasia often do not exhibit signs of amusia, and individuals who have

amusia often do not exhibit signs of aphasia. It seems that neurological activity involved in
music mimics language but is not synonymous with its processing, as demonstrated by patients

who improve or perform better with music therapy.