Author: Oliver Sacks
_Oliver Sacks_
Reading time: 23 minutes
Synopsis
In Der einarmige Pianist, Oliver Sacks writes about how music affects the human brain. He shares interesting stories about patients he met as a neurologist. He shows how music can cause or cure mental problems. He also shows how different people experience music in different ways.
What’s in it for you: Understand how music and the human brain are connected.
If you have read a book by neurologist Oliver Sacks, you know he is a respected expert. He also shares many interesting patient stories from his medical work. In his books, Sacks tells readers about brain illnesses and injuries in a fun but serious way. He explains everything so that even people who are not doctors can understand. During his career, he met truly special people. One of them was Der Mann, der seine Frau mit einem Hut verwechselte, who inspired one of his book titles.
In his 2009 book, Der einarmige Pianist, Oliver Sacks focuses on how music and the human brain are connected. The story of Leon Fleisher shows that people with only one arm can play the piano very well. Leon could not use his right hand for a long time because of an illness. But his love for music made him strong. He kept working hard and became a master pianist.
Fleisher’s story is one of many strange things about music. There is much to talk about: Music starts in the brain, of course. But where exactly? And why do some people experience it more than others? Does making music change your brain? What happens to our mind when we listen to music? How can music help treat brain and mental illnesses? And how can some people see sounds? You will learn about all these things and more in the following sections (blinks).
Blink 1 – Hearing Sounds: Not Everyone Can Enjoy Music.
If we think about the last time we heard music, we usually don’t have to think hard. It’s everywhere: on the radio, in a café, background music on TV, or even our phone’s ringtone. Music is simply everywhere!
Every culture in the world has its own music. People everywhere enjoy listening to music, playing instruments, or singing and dancing. But some people cannot really feel the beauty of music. We call this inability to enjoy music ‘amusia’.
For example, about five percent of all people have ‘tone deafness’. This means they cannot tell when someone sings or plays wrong notes in a song. The same thing happens with rhythm: some people just cannot feel or keep a rhythm. A famous example is Che Guevara. He often danced a Mambo when the band played a Tango.
Even if they probably wouldn’t play music well themselves, people with tone or rhythm deafness can still enjoy music and dancing. But it is different for the worst form of amusia. In this case, patients do not hear music as beautiful. They hear it as meaningless, or even as terrible noise. Some patients said music sounded like a car crash.
Besides these brain differences, there are also people who just don’t care about music. Music means nothing to them and does not make them feel anything. Charles Darwin and Sigmund Freud were two such people.
So, not every brain can hear or process music in the same way most people’s brains do. But what about the other way around? Does our brain change if we make music ourselves?
Blink 2 – Making Music Changes Our Brain.
When we play an instrument, our brain is used in a very special way. This leaves real marks on the brain. Doctors can see from brain scans if someone is a musician. Musicians are the only group of people who show a clear, special brain structure. This is not true for painters, writers, or mathematicians.
Research has found that these special brain structures are not there from birth. They slowly form when you make music. The younger someone starts to learn an instrument, the more their brain changes. But even as we get older, making music changes our brain quickly. One study showed that playing simple finger exercises on the piano changed brain activity in the motor cortex (the brain’s movement center) in just a few minutes.
We all have a natural ability for music from birth. Talent may be different for everyone. But every person can learn a musical instrument and train their body movements for it.
You don’t even need to read music or speak the same language as your teacher. For example, with the Suzuki method, children as young as three can learn to play the violin. They learn just by listening and copying. This method works for all children. It doesn’t matter if they are thought to be talented or not.
So, musical child prodigies are not born with a musical brain. They just start making music very early. Their talent helps them reach a master level faster than others.
Blink 3 – Music in my Ears: Perfect Pitch Can Also Be a Problem.
What key is your nose blowing in? For many, this question sounds completely silly. But people with perfect pitch can answer it right away. They don’t need to think or compare it to another note. They hear someone blow their nose and immediately know it’s a C or an A.
It’s the same for these people with all sounds. Sir Frederick Ouseley, for example, was a music professor in Oxford. He often said that the wind outside was blowing in D, the thunder was rumbling in G, and the clock was ticking in B-flat minor. Every time someone checked his claims, they were correct.
For people with perfect pitch, every note has its own special feel and quality. Most people know notes by how they sound compared to other notes. But someone with perfect pitch knows the sound of a note by itself, without any other notes around it.
Only one person in 10,000 has perfect pitch. Many of them become musicians. About one in ten professional musicians has this skill. This special gift is not always present from birth. It can also be learned, usually by starting music lessons at a young age.
It might seem that perfect pitch is a great extra sense with only good sides. But it can also be very upsetting. For example, musicians with perfect pitch have to tune their instruments very often. They do this even when they practice alone. If they have to play instruments that are out of tune, like a piano that cannot be tuned quickly, it causes them confusion and stress.
Blink 4 – All Ears: Blindness and Synesthesia Can Improve Music Skills.
Another interesting thing about music is synesthesia. People with this ability experience things with one sense, but also with one or more other senses. For example, they might see smells or feel colors. This experience is different for each person with synesthesia. In most cases of musical synesthesia, people see sounds as colors or patterns. This happens automatically: they hear a G note and see light blue.
Some synesthetic musicians gain big advantages from their skill. Composer David Caldwell, for example, makes sure his music sounds good. He also makes sure the sounds, rhythms, and melodies match well in terms of color. Only then is a piece of music perfect for him.
On the other hand, some people have one less sense. They make up for this loss through hearing. Blind people often have amazing musical skills. They are not distracted by what they see. So, they can focus much better on sounds and melodies than other people.
Brain research has found interesting things about this. If someone becomes blind later in life, the brain areas that used to process what they saw change. They start to work for other senses instead. This means more brain power is available for hearing, smelling, and feeling. So, these senses can take in and process information better.
For example, about 60% of blind professional musicians have perfect pitch. Blind children can also express themselves much better with music than sighted children their age. This happens even without music lessons.
Blink 5 – Specially Gifted: People with a Low IQ Can Be Very Musical.
There’s a common idea: A brilliant musician or composer might be a bit odd, but always very smart. Such musicians certainly exist. But amazing musical talent is also often found in people who would score low on an IQ test.
For example, music is the most common special talent in people with ‘savant syndrome’. These are people who have an amazing skill in one specific area. Martin, one of the author’s patients, would be seen as having very low intelligence by an IQ test. However, his intelligence is all focused on hearing.
He is incredibly musical and has a ‘phonographic memory’. This means he can remember every small detail of every piece of music he has ever heard. He can sing or play over 2,000 operas from memory. He can also play a song perfectly right after hearing it for the first time.
People with Williams syndrome also have amazing musical talent. This is a genetic condition. Their IQ is usually only around 60. Other thinking skills are often very limited in this rare illness. At the same time, patients are known for being very positive and social. They love to connect with others through music, singing, and dancing.
Their musical talent and love for music come from a well-developed left auditory cortex. This part of the brain is linked to hearing. This is stronger than in healthy people of the same age. Gloria Lenhoff, for example, has Williams syndrome. She can sing opera songs in over 30 languages. But she cannot add 5 and 3 together. These people are not less intelligent than others. Their thinking skills are just very focused on special areas.
Blink 6 – The Rhythm That Makes You Move: Music Can Help Heal Illnesses.
When the right song plays at the gym, it pushes us to give our all for the last few minutes, even after hard work. It’s the same with dancing: you often sweat and forget about time. Music simply has an exciting effect that makes you want to move. Music therapy uses this effect to treat various illnesses.
This is true for patients who are paralyzed due to an accident or illness. First, music helps these people work hard during their training. Second, with paralysis, sometimes people just forget how to move a leg or an arm. Music then acts like a ‘starter’. It quietly activates the right muscles. The body remembers the movement patterns. Then the patient can start to train their muscles again.
Music can also help with other illnesses. Parkinson’s, for example, is a nerve disease. It often causes shaking, unsteady movements, and stiff muscles. The author writes in his book about a patient named Frances D. She had suffered from Parkinson’s for years and had big problems moving. But when the right music played, she could surprisingly move like a healthy person. A light piece of music with a steady rhythm can help the body control movements.
Music also helps many Tourette’s patients manage their daily lives. Tourette’s syndrome is an illness where patients have extreme and uncontrolled tics. They might suddenly twitch, make faces, or shout. Music where they can improvise helps these patients to use their energy in a different way. David Aldridge, for example, is an excellent jazz drummer with Tourette’s syndrome. Whenever he would normally shout or twitch, he simply plays a special drum solo on stage instead.
Blink 7 – Let Melodies Speak: Music Therapy Helps with Speech Problems and Dementia.
Sometimes we wake up on the wrong side of the bed. We spill coffee and get stuck in traffic on the way to work. This feels like the perfect start to a terrible day. But then our favorite song comes on the radio. We turn it up loud, and all the anger is gone. This good effect of music can also be used in therapy.
Music therapy became popular after World War II. Doctors found that music often helped soldiers who came back from the war. It helped them deal with and heal their mental and physical injuries better.
Music can do more than just motivate and improve mood. It can also help people express themselves and talk with others who have similar problems. Samuel S., for example, was a patient who had aphasia after a stroke. Aphasia is a brain-related speech problem. Even after two years of strong speech therapy, he could not say a single word. But when he started music therapy and practiced simple songs with his therapist, he could give short answers to questions after just two months.
The reason is that the speech area in his brain was mostly damaged by the stroke. But the parts that process musical expression were not damaged. In music therapy, he learned to treat spoken words like musical sounds, using rhythm and correct tone. This helped him to form simple spoken sentences again.
Music is also a real blessing for people with dementia or Alzheimer’s. In these illnesses, the brain areas for memory and language are damaged first. But the musical part of the brain often stays healthy for much longer. So these patients can express themselves and communicate through music. Woody, for example, was a patient who could remember almost nothing. But he still knew every single song he had ever sung by heart.
Blink 8 – Turn off the Noise: Music Can Trigger Epileptic Seizures.
Everyone has different tastes, and we all know music we can’t stand. If we don’t like a certain song, we probably just turn it off or leave the place where it’s playing. This is usually just a matter of taste. But for some people, certain music is truly dangerous. They get an epileptic seizure from specific songs or types of music.
Epilepsy is an illness where a sudden trigger, like flashing lights, causes a seizure. This often includes muscle spasms and then fainting. For some people with epilepsy, the trigger is a piece of music, a certain set of notes, or the sound of an instrument. In these cases, it is called musicogenic epilepsy.
The illness comes in different forms. A mild case, for example, means only weaker seizures happen. Also, the triggering music is known. Often, these people can just avoid listening to that music.
A very serious case was Nikonov, a famous music critic from the 19th century. One day, he had a seizure at the opera. After that, he grew more and more afraid of music. He eventually got strong seizures from any kind of music. Of course, he could no longer do his job. His fear of music eventually controlled his whole life.
Now it gets really scary. In rare cases, a patient does not even need to hear music to get a seizure and faint. It is enough for them to just imagine it. Afterwards, patients often cannot describe or sing the music that caused it. But most say the piece felt strangely familiar to them.
Blink 9 – What an Earworm: Deaf People Often Suffer from Annoying Musical Hallucinations.
Everyone knows ‘earworms’ and how annoying they can be. It’s usually a song we don’t like anyway. We might not have heard it for ages, but then we can’t get it out of our heads. Our brain plays it over and over for us.
Musical hallucinations are like an earworm. But they seem so real that most people who have one for the first time try to find the speakers the music is coming from. Only when they realize there are no speakers do they slowly understand that the music is actually playing in their head.
It seems that hearing problems increase the risk of musical hallucinations. They mostly happen in older people. Mrs. C., for example, was a patient who had stronger and stronger musical hallucinations as her hearing got worse. The music in her head was loud and bothersome. It sounded like broken old records playing different songs at random: Christmas songs, folk songs, and musical tunes followed her all day. She could only stop this music by doing something that needed a lot of thought, like having a conversation or playing bridge.
Doctors used an MRI scan and found that the hallucinations happened because her brain tried to stay active, even with her hearing loss getting worse. The part of the brain for hearing lacked input. So it created its own activity. Mrs. C.’s hearing problems were eventually cured, but the hallucinations stayed. There is still no good treatment for this problem today. Mrs. C. slowly learned to live with it.
Blink 10 – Some People Suddenly Develop Musical Superpowers.
It would be great if we woke up one morning and suddenly had musical superpowers. We could write beautiful songs, make everyone dance, and finally express our feelings through music. This has happened to some people. But for some, it did not turn out well.
Tony Cicoria, for example, was a 42-year-old Italian father. He was struck in the face by lightning. He survived the accident. But from that day on, he was so obsessed with music that he had little time for anything else. He had a strong need to listen to piano music and learn to play it himself. He was so obsessed that his wife left him. Now, he is a brilliant pianist, even though he had no special interest in music before the lightning strike.
Strangely, brain scans showed no injuries to his brain. So, the physical reason for this strong love of music is still unknown.
Sometimes, such a strange change happens without any clear reason. Patient Grace M. was 55 years old and not musical at all. Then she suddenly started hearing parts of songs in her head. She recorded them because she could not read or write music. After ten years, she had recorded over 3,000 parts. She used them to make her own songs. Other musicians gave her excellent reviews for this work. But for her too, no physical or mental reasons could be found to explain this.
Summary
People’s musical abilities are very different. Some have perfect pitch. Others have no musical feeling at all. Some illnesses can improve musical skills. Other illnesses can make music a terrible experience. Music therapy is a good way to treat brain-related illnesses and injuries.
What you can do:
Don’t think it’s too late to learn an instrument. Studies show that the special brain structures for playing an instrument can still form late in life. No matter how old you are when you start to learn an instrument – you can do it, and it will change your brain in a good way.
Don’t judge anyone for their music taste. If your neighbor doesn’t like music and sometimes complains about yours, it doesn’t mean they are boring or uptight. It could be that their brain simply hears your favorite music differently than yours does.
Use the positive power of music. Music therapy is a known treatment for dementia or paralysis. But you can also use music every day to motivate yourself during exercise. And you can use it to communicate with people.
Source: https://www.blinkist.com/https://www.blinkist.com/de/books/der-einarmige-pianist-de