Your Brain On Music BY KIM CARSON
I
’ve always wondered how I can have such a strong, visceral reaction to a song from my youth when I hear it on the radio. Has that ever happened to you? Driving down Main Street hearing the first few notes and being magically transported back to a specific moment in time. Powerful enough to bring to the surface strong emotions. I’ve always thought it strange that tears involuntarily can come to my eyes upon hearing a few notes and THEN the memory tied to the song will come to mind. It’s completely unconscious. The memory doesn’t trigger the tears; the music triggers the tears, and the memory tied to that song follows. For me, it’s usually something from the 70’s; I was 13 years old in love with the idea of love. I grew up in Detroit between 7 and 8 Mile (yeah, the one Eminem sings about). As a kid I just didn’t fit in—I was different. I wasn’t the most popular kid in school and socially it was always awkward for me. I was uncoordinated so you can only imagine what emotional reaction Dodge Ball would stir up in me. Music and radio were my escape, a magical world I could disappear into knowing I could count on my favorite DJs for companionship, and the music was there to soothe my soul. It was a constant.
8
May 2021
MUSIC AND MEMORIES
One experience that comes to mind is this one: I recently heard the song Right Back To Where I Started From by Maxine Nightengale on the radio. Hearing the first few notes, teletransported me back to a hotel room in Knoxville,Tennessee, 16-years old, turning on the radio, unpacking my suitcase and feeling so excited, knowing that tomorrow will be my first day on the air reading the weather on WKVQ radio station. Facebook friend Debbie Ralph posted saying, “...at 67 it’s such a sweet mind trip for a bit. Our most primal areas of our brain react strongly to evocative sensory experiences. Heard Grand Funk outta the blue; (suddenly) I was that cute little hippy chick and 16 out carousing with my bestie and going to concerts at the LA Forum.” How and why are music, emotions, and memories tied together? I asked ED ROTH, Professor of Music Therapy at the School of Music-WMU. Ed is also the director of the BRAIN (Brain Research and Interdisciplinary Neurosciences) laboratory. One of Roth’s most recent courses includes a neuroscience of music course titled “Your Brain on Music.”
Roth says, firstly, memory is actually quite complicated. Memories are considered shortterm or long-term, conscious or unconscious, knowledge about events, general knowledge about the world, and knowledge about the order in which certain activities take place; when building a sandwich, I don’t start with mustard; first, I start with bread, then maybe meat, and so on. To answer the how part of your question, memories are built in context: combinations of sensory and emotional information. It’s generally thought that
Ed Roth, Professor of Music Therapy at the School of Music-WMU
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