Saturdays News - Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain

Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain

Music can move us to the heights or depths of emotion. It can persuade us to buy something, or remind us of our first date. It can lift us out of depression when nothing else can. It can get us dancing to its beat.  But the power of music goes much, much further. Indeed, music occupies more areas of our brain than language does—humans are a musical species.

Oliver Sacks’s compassionate, compelling tales of people struggling to adapt to different neurological conditions have fundamentally changed the way we think of our own brains, and of the human experience. In Musicophilia, he examines the powers of music through the individual experiences of patients, musicians, and everyday people—from a man who is struck by lightning and suddenly inspired to become a pianist at the age of forty-two, to an entire group of children with Williams syndrome, who are hypermusical from birth; from people with “amusia,” to whom a symphony sounds like the clattering of pots and pans, to a man whose memory spans only seven seconds—for everything but music.

Our exquisite sensitivity to music can sometimes go wrong: Sacks explores how catchy tunes can subject us to hours of mental replay, and how a surprising number of people acquire nonstop musical hallucinations that assault them night and day. Yet far more frequently, music goes right: Sacks describes how music can animate people with Parkinson’s disease who cannot otherwise move, give words to stroke patients who cannot otherwise speak, and calm and organize people whose memories are ravaged by Alzheimer’s or amnesia.

Music is irresistible, haunting, and unforgettable, and in Musicophilia, Oliver Sacks tells us why.

(see also May 12 - SSTattler Saturday: Face Blindness(Prosopagnosia): Oliver Sacks)

Oliver Sacks - Musicophilia - Strokes, Language, and Music

Oliver Sacks talks about strokes and the benefits of musical therapy.

TED x ColumbiaSC - Enabling Fluent Speech in Non-Fluent Aphasia

Dr. Julius Fridriksson

Director of the Aphasia Laboratory at the University of South Carolina, where he seeks to clarify the relationship between brain damage and speech/language impediments. His work has led to significant breakthroughs in helping stroke victims regain their ability to speak.

(Comments SSTattler: Dr. Fridriksson did not mention "music" vs nonFluent but there very similar like iPod vs nonFluent)

Music Therapy for My Second Mom

I've known Harriet Eckler for 47 non-stop years since I was 8 years old and now she's a TV star since her stroke she suffered last month.

Stroke Patients Regain Speech Through Singing

Stroke patients regain speech through singing.

 

 

From singing to speaking: facilitating recovery from nonfluent aphasia.

Schlaug G, Norton A, Marchina S, Zipse L, Wan CY.

Department of Neurology, Music, Neuroimaging & Stroke Recovery Laboratories, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center & Harvard Medical School, 330 Brookline Avenue, Boston, MA 02215, USA.

Abstract
It has been reported for more than 100 years that patients with severe nonfluent aphasia are better at singing lyrics than they are at speaking the same words. This observation led to the development of melodic intonation therapy (MIT). However, the efficacy of this therapy has yet to be substantiated in a randomized controlled trial. Furthermore, its underlying neural mechanisms remain unclear. The two unique components of MIT are the intonation of words and simple phrases using a melodic contour that follows the prosody of speech and the rhythmic tapping of the left hand that accompanies the production of each syllable and serves as a catalyst for fluency. Research has shown that both components are capable of engaging fronto-temporal regions in the right hemisphere, thereby making MIT particularly well suited for patients with large left hemisphere lesions who also suffer from nonfluent aphasia. Recovery from aphasia can happen in two ways: either through the recruitment of perilesional brain regions in the affected hemisphere, with variable recruitment of right-hemispheric regions if the lesion is small, or through the recruitment of homologous language and speech-motor regions in the unaffected hemisphere if the lesion of the affected hemisphere is extensive. Treatment-associated neural changes in patients undergoing MIT indicate that the unique engagement of right-hemispheric structures (e.g., the superior temporal lobe, primary sensorimotor, premotor and inferior frontal gyrus regions) and changes in the connections across these brain regions may be responsible for its therapeutic effect.

Read the full free article From Singing to Speaking ...