Music Improves Brain Function

For most people music is an enjoyable, although momentary, form of entertainment. But for those who seriously practiced a musical instrument when they were young, perhaps when they played in a school orchestra or even a rock band, the musical experience can be something more. Recent research shows that a strong correlation exists between musical training for children and certain other mental abilities.

The research was discussed at a session at a recent gathering of acoustics experts in Austin, Texas.

Laurel Trainor, director of the Institute for Music and the Mind at McMaster University in West Hamilton, Ontario, and colleagues compared preschool children who had taken music lessons with those who did not. Those with some training showed larger brain responses on a number of sound recognition tests given to the children. Her research indicated that musical training appears to modify the brain’s auditory cortex.

Can larger claims be made for the influence on the brain of musical training? Does training change thinking or cognition in general?

Trainor again says yes. Even a year or two of music training leads to enhanced levels of memory and attention when measured by the same type of tests that monitor electrical and magnetic impulses in the brain.

“We therefore hypothesize that musical training (but not necessarily passive listening to music) affects attention and memory, which provides a mechanism whereby musical training might lead to better learning across a number of domains,” Trainor said.

Trainor suggested that the reason for this is that the motor and listening skills needed to play an instrument in concert with other people appears to heavily involve attention, memory and the ability to inhibit actions. Merely listening passively to music to Mozart — or any other composer — does not produce the same changes in attention and memory.

via Music Improves Brain Function | LiveScience.

Xenophilia (the band) on CD Baby

Now available: Xenophilia (the band) on CD Baby.

This merry band of name droppers existed for over 10 years and released only one album, thus making it a rare collector’s item sought after by relatives of the band members.

Hear song samples of all 11 tracks.

It only took me eight years to get this CD on line. I still like to listen to it from time to time.

If CD Baby does their job, you should be able to download individual songs for 99 cents soon from iTunes.

I’m actually really curious to see if someone I’ve never met likes one of my songs enough to pay a dollar for it.  It could happen…

 

Close Encounters of the Third Kind Scene

I always liked this part. I wanted the music to get a lot faster so it sounded like there was much more data being transferred, however. Great score.

Xeno’s Absolute Pitch System: Lesson 2, Middle C in the context of other keys

Xeno’s Absolute Pitch System: Lesson 2, Middle C in the context of other keys.

Lesson  two provides your ear with something critical that it has likely never heard until now: how a  C note relates to all of the other keys in western music.

Listen:  Download or play Lesson 2 here.

Instructions:

Just listening to this lesson starts to set up note permanence in your brain, but the process will go even faster if you do this…

- In the first part with the scales, listen closely to the soft middle C note in the background. 

- Attempt to sing a C note right before the C note plays at the end of each small song in each key.

Listening actively this way will turn on the light and you will finally “get” that a “C” is always there, always a “C” no matter what else is going on.

Learn to hear Middle C in relation to music in other keys today.  Don’t forget Lesson 1!

Results:

Three random tests during the day hours after listening to this allowed me to recall middle C correctly. This ability was gone the next morning, however. I guess we need a lesson 3…

How do I fix my problem with name dropping?

A commenter pointed out that I have a real problem with name dropping.  What can be done about name dropping? The first step seems to be to admit that you have a problem.

Hi. I’m Xeno, and I’ve dropped a lot of names. It is lame. It’s all over my posts for years, even on my old site.  I’m fascinated by fame. It started when I found out as a boy that my uncle was part of a world famous rock group.  Then I got into the Beatles and saw that these famous guys were really loved. They were famous and they were loved … some kind of super love… more loved than I’d ever seen anyone loved. Girls would chase them and scream! In my growing brain, fame became love. Around this time my mother and father split up. My father was a musician who was trying to be famous. I guess my kid brain thought that my parents split up because my dad wasn’t getting famous. Partly true due to money issues. More reinforcement that fame = love, unfame = rejection.

Later when I told people about my famous rock star relative, it opened a few doors for me as a musician.  I think so anyway. Perhaps we got in based on real talent or charm, but I always suspected that once you have a “foot in the door” with knowing one famous person, other famous people will know you. From there, you can get addicted. Intermittent reinforcement makes a behavior last even longer.

One of my closest friends had the same problem and we would sort of feed off of each other.  We wanted to know famous people, to be in the “in” crowd. We knew the top musicians in the town. We got passed in free to sold-out shows when other people had to stand in line. We high-fived each other  for having “connections”.  We played shows in places the famous people played. We, ourselves, paid special attention to people who knew famous people. We saw the same thing with other people wanting to be around us. When you do get well known, it sucks that you can’t tell if people like you for yourself, or because of your fame score.  We had groupies. We had a few stalkers. But it was all a rush.

Looking in the proverbial mirror tonight, I am facing my idol worship. I see foundations of motivations for everything I have done, music, my career, this blog … so much is based on a what must be an incomplete equation: I don’t really believe that fame is love.  Fame is fame. Love is love.

I’ve had some awareness of my fame seeking psychosis for years.  I stopped playing music live because it felt too ego-driven… (We are often like pendulums. We notice a problem, then swing too far in the other direction.)  … but I remain ego driven… it seems deeply built in.

Example: By posting a few things interesting each day on a blog for years, I’ve built up “a following” of web readers. The fact that I’ve reached over 1.5 million page views gives me a sense of purpose.  Sure, I love helping people and entertaining people, but there is also some motivation for this blog that is prideful.

I’m visualizing dropping out of everything and walking on a beach as a happy unknown bum for the rest of my life. (Again the pendulum swings.)

What is the healthy balance?  Who of you has confronted the name dropping demon and won? Who has fixed a flawed fame fantasy?

Strange Exits: Coyotes kill Canadian folk singer

Two coyotes have attacked and killed a 19-year-old folk singer in Nova Scotia, eastern Canada, officials say.

Taylor Mitchell, a promising musician from Toronto, died in hospital after the animals pounced as she hiked alone in Cape Breton Highlands National Park.

Walkers alerted park rangers after hearing her screams. The rangers shot one coyote, but were still searching for the second.

Attacks by coyotes on humans are rare; they usually prey on deer and hares.

Bleeding heavily from multiple bite wounds, the singer-songwriter was airlifted to a Halifax hospital, but died of her injuries on Wednesday morning, authorities said.

‘Phenomenally talented’

“Coyotes are normally afraid of humans. This is a very irregular occurrence,” Brigdit Leger, a spokeswoman for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, told Reuters news agency.

She said the two coyotes were “extremely aggressive” when authorities arrived at the scene. The small wolf-like animals are found from Central America to the United States and Canada. Ms Mitchell – touted as a rising star in the folk music scene – was nominated for a Canadian Folk Music Award earlier this year in the youth category.

“Words can’t begin to express the sadness and tragedy of losing such a sweet, compassionate, vibrant, and phenomenally talented young woman,” Lisa Weitz, Ms Mitchell’s manager, said in an e-mail to the Associated Press news agency.

“She just turned 19 two months ago, and was so excited about the future.”

via BBC NEWS | Americas | Coyotes kill Canadian folk singer.

Enjoy some of Taylor Mitchell’s music:

Horrible fate.

Hats off for Taylor Mitchell, an artist who went her own way.

Google opens OneBox music service + free music

Search giant Google has entered the online music market with a new service for finding and buying music online.

OneBox is an alliance with music sites Lala and MySpace-owned iLike.

The US-only service allows people to search using song titles, artists or using snippets of lyrics and will also stream sought-after tracks.

Mark Mulligan, an analyst at research firm Forrester, said the service may offer a compelling alternative to illegal file-sharing.

“Apple can do little about iPod owners downloading from BitTorrent,” he said in a blog post. “But Google on the other hand can.”

BitTorrent software is widely used to trade music and movies.

“Just imagine if when a consumer searches for a song, alongside all of those Torrent results is a heavily integrated Google music offering.”

When users search using OneBox a pop-up widget powered by iLike or Lala offers to play the entire song.

A MySpace box allows people to buy MP3s of the tracks and also highlights music videos and other information, such as upcoming concerts by the artists.

According to Google, the words “music” and “lyrics” are among the top 10 search terms of all time.

via BBC NEWS | Technology | Google opens OneBox music service.

My music is free (left box.net) and there is a lot of other free music out there.  Try iRATE if you like hearing new music every day.

British to block illegal filesharers’ internet connections, find the best free music

Lord Mandelson, the business secretary, warned internet users today that the days of “consequence-free” illegal filesharing are over as he unveiled the government’s plan for cracking down on online piracy.

Mandelson, speaking at the government’s digital creative industries conference, C&binet, confirmed that the internet connections of persistent offenders could be blocked – but only as a last resort – from the summer of 2011.

He added that a “legislate and enforce” strategy was the only way to protect the intellectual property rights of content producers.

The strategy, which will be officially set out in the government’s digital economy bill in late November, will involve a staged process of warning notifications with internet suspension as a last resort.

“It must become clear that the days of consequence-free widespread online infringement are over,” Mandelson said. “Technical measures will be a last resort and I have no expectation of mass suspensions resulting.”

The legislation is expected to come into force in April next year.

The effectiveness of the warning letters to persistent illegal filesharers will be monitored for the first 12 months. If illegal filesharing has not dropped by 70% by April 2011, then cutting off people’s internet connections could be introduced three months later, from the summer of that year.

“If we reach the point of suspension for an individual, they will be informed in advance, having previously received two notifications – and will have the opportunity to appeal,” Mandelson added. “The British government’s view is that taking people’s work without due payment is wrong and that, as an economy based on creativity, we cannot sit back and do nothing as this happens.” …

Cutting off illegal filesharers’ internet access was originally ruled out in Lord Carter’s Digital Britain report released in June.

via Lord Mandelson sets date for blocking filesharers’ internet connections | Technology | guardian.co.uk.

Somehow I think the file sharers will find a way around this.  Not sure why people need to bother sharing files illegally, however. There is so much free music out there!  You can probably find hours of free songs you like just as much as the ones you don’t want to pay for. Songs on this site are free to download, for example.  Try this:

Fingertips…  calls itself “An intelligent guide to free and legal music on the web”. Each week Fingertips reviews several free music downloads. Rather than trying to be an exhaustive source of music downloads, Fingertips tries to select a few of the very best.

There was a really promising open source project called iRATE radio … not sure if someone is going to take it over and maintain it. I may do that. Seems really cool.

It’s difficult to find music that’s actually worth listening to. Although many bands offer music on their websites, there’s no real way to tell if it’s any good without actually downloading it. The labels do serve the (somewhat) legitimate purpose of picking out the good from the bad. But we can do that ourselves with legal downloads by using collaborative filtering, for example by downloading music with iRATE radio, which you’ll find at http://irate.sourceforge.net/.

- Set it to automatic download in the settings.
- Rate songs and more will download.
- Hit the trash button to remove a song from your list.
- Windows users, the mp3 songs are located in a folder on your hard drive. Search for the “/irate/download/” folder to find them. You’ll have to rename them and copy them to somewhere else, it seems, to keep them.
- I’m still trying to figure out how to get my music on there…

Xeno’s Absolute Pitch System: Lesson 1, Middle C

Xeno’s Absolute Pitch System: Lesson 1, Middle C.
Learn to hear Middle C in relation to music in other keys.

It starts very simple then gets more complicated. Listening to this free music-only music lesson will make you 3% smarter.

I’ve once again been wondering if I missed the boat by not being taught to recognize musical note names when I was 2 to 3 years old (some research says that’s the time to do it).

If we can learn as adults to have absolute pitch, it seems we should learn in the same way we learn the names of colors as kids… by playing.

I can hear a “C” note and sing it back several minutes later, but if listen to some music in another key, forget it. The note memory gets erased. Why should I no longer recognize blue after seeing something red?

That got me thinking…  we learn colors by comparing them to eachother… mixing them, painting with them … perhaps I could create a series of compositions that compare notes … show a note, and then gradually hide it in other notes. “Hide and seek” and peek-a-book fascinate kids for a good reason: they help our brains learn quickly.

Kids do this with colored pens. Color with one, then put it away for a while… then bring it back. This might be a way to learn to still recall a “C” any time at all.

I really don’t want to work too hard at this. It should be fun. I just want to wake up one day and be able to recognize any notes I hear by name.

See that crazy sheet music? Believe it or not, that’s part of the actual score I wrote played and recorded today for:  “Lesson 1 – Middle C“. Download it or listen here for free (20 MB MP3).

All you have to do is listen once a day and the song will program your brain.  It works by slowly embedding C notes from an 88 key concert piano into somewhat random compositions in various keys. There are many different tricks in this song.

Your brain hears all of this and forms new connections, new associations. The idea is to fix the C in once place in comparison to other keys. This is not something you typically hear in modern western music. Most songs are in a key. It is if we are never shown red and blue at the same time, so we never figure out how they relate.

My hypothesis is that listening to this lesson will help people internalize the C note and thus be able to remember it longer.  Let me know if it helps you.

Want Lesson 2? Sign up for Twitter and Follow Me, or subscribe to the RSS feed.

The Throat Singers of Tuva

Testing the limits of vocal ingenuity, throat-singers can create sounds unlike anything in ordinary speech and song–carrying two musical lines simultaneously, say, or harmonizing with a waterfall

via The Throat Singers of Tuva: Scientific American.

How is it done? One person commenting on YouTube says “You make an L shape in your mouth, the tip of the tongue being the top of the L, and the back of your tongue lifts and flattens out to change the pitches.”