Musician's brains different

Subject: Musician's brains different
From: Wolfgang
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 06:58 AM

from: Journal of Neuroscience (Okt. 2003 Vol. 23(27), S. 9240-9245)

Brain Structures Differ between Musicians and Non-Musicians

Christian Gaser and Gottfried Schlaug


Those of us with little or no aptitude (or, if you like, talent) for playing a musical instrument now have an excuse: our brains aren't built for it. Such is the finding of Gaser and Schlaug in this week's Journal. They found that a subject's musical experience, as a non-musician, an amateur, or a professional, was correlated with gray
matter volume in brain areas that are activated while reading and playing music, including auditory, visual-spatial, and motor areas. No wonder some people are better able to identify a tone without reference, read those funny little marks on a page and translate them, fingers flying, into a recognizable melody. But were they born that way, or is it the years of diligent practice that reshaped their cortex? The data suggest the latter: a voxel-by-voxel morphometric analysis showed that brain structural differences increased with the practice intensity and years of training of a musician. Might the musically adroit have some pre-existing disposition, however?
This remains to be seen. Some might argue that the subjects, right-handed male keyboardists, are not entirely representative of professional musicians, but the study seems to make one thing clear: your brain (and your talent) won't grow without practice. (the journal's abstract).

Some of you might like to know though the finding is not extremely surprising. Exercise a part of your body (like for instance your brain) and it grows (stronger). The new thing in the full article is the more exact localisation which brain parts are growing how much. And BTW, bad old phrenology has made a spectacular comeback during the last decade in a completely new shape.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 07:05 AM

Does that mean we can have our bumps felt? Or do we have to have an MRI scan...?

Sounds interesting. I wonder if it will come up in this/next week's New Scientist?

Steve

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Wolfgang
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 09:43 AM

Bump feeling is out since about a century, now it is called (if you don't recollect what they did exactly) "neural imaging" and it is often more than just MRI. MRI shows the structures, other methods show the activity distribution during spefific tasks.
More seriously, 'bump feeling' was the wrong approach, for the shape of the head doesn't change with practise in a certain field, only that part of the brain which is active during the exercise grows larger. That's different from exercising muscles. Schwarzenegging shows at the first glance. Musicians must rely on bulging instrument cases for impression management.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 09:46 AM

"Might the musically adroit have some pre-existing disposition, however?"

Yes, I'm sure they do. Me, for example. I can be driven up the wall by pop music which other people don't even notice. I want not to hear it, but my nervous system can't stop responding to it. That's got to be innate.

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: GUEST,Kim C no cookie
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 09:57 AM

I had my head read by a phrenologist once. It was actually pretty fascinating.

So do they talk about how musicians' brains aren't built to handle complex mathematical equations? ;-)

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Bill D
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 10:15 AM

Science is learning more & more about how people are simply 'wired' differently and have different abilities. One can, with practice, do 'better' in some things, but musical skills, math skills, etc, seem to be given out in ways we don't understand yet. I have GREAT difficulty with the intricasies of music theory, but I have very good spatial and temporal sense. I can sit and look at a room and KNOW how furniture will fit into it, and how long it will take to do the job.(some of this is just calibrating the brain to 'see' the relationships, but some people can just never manage this)....and I can program VCRs and digital watches without the instructions!

My wife, on the other hand, used to design computer programs, and would 'see' relational database structure in her head!

So...sure..I am not a bit surprised that musicians have been found to have brain structures that are different. Wouldn't it be fascinating to have a scan of Mozart or Beethoven? Remember, Beethoven did his final composing while deaf...'hearing' all those things in his head!

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 10:45 AM

Kim, I'm a musician and a matematician. OK, I'm not a great mathematician; but then I'm not a great musician either. I'm a computer programmer by trade, and I know that the knack for music and the knack for coding are often found together: it's all to do with understanding structures and relationships.

Nobody has mentioned taxi-drivers yet ...

Steve

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: GUEST,petr
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 11:49 AM

Ive heard that in some experiments in which they played music
and observed brain activity - non musicians auditory centers were active, but in musicians not only auditory but the language centers were active too, which makes sense to me - as music is very much like a language.
I dont know the source for these experiments though.
petr

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: treewind
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 12:07 PM

Language is learnt. Musicians listening to music have learned a whole range of mental models and images to process while they are listening, which is just like a language.

Similarly I would expect that you'd get 'language centre' responses in anyone listing to speech in their own language, but far less response in that area if the language was a foreign one that they didn't understand.

Anahata

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 02:08 PM

This is the classic "Nature/Nurture" debate, which has engaged philosophers and evolutionary biologists since time immemorial. The "Nature" side says that we are born with all the facilities we will ever need. The "Nurture" side says we are born as a tabula rasa (blank slate) which is filled in by our experiences. Common sense, which both philosophers and evolutionary biologists have little of (I belong in the latter category), suggests that our aptitudes for the tasks that face us in life are a mixture of both - someone with no innate genetic ability can, with diligence become reasonably profficient at a task or vice versa.

A good recent example of this (Navigation-Related Structural Change In the Hippocampi of Taxi Drivers) was published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 97, no. 8, April 11, 2000, pp. 4398-403. The study by scientists fron University College London presented evidence that the brains of London taxi drivers are more highly developed than those of their fellow citizens. More experienced drivers had larger hippocampi suggesting that Nurture had a strong effect. In other words - practice makes perfect.

Incidently the study won an Ignoble Prize along with the paper: An Analysis of the Forces Required to Drag Sheep over Various Surfaces."
[PUBLISHED IN: Applied Ergonomics, vol. 33, no. 6, November 2002, pp. 523-31.

For more details on the Ignobles see:

http://www.improbable.com/ig/ig-pastwinners.html

It is hilarious.

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Joybell
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 05:44 PM

I am a singer who has always sung and I have a strange ability which seems to relate to numbers and measurements. I can select a piece of trimming for a piece of sewing I'm working on, without measuring either, and it will exactly fit the article. I might add that I dislike sewing and rarely do it, so I doubt if it's practice. Mostly I just glance at both without thinking, in fact it works better if I'm distracted. I am also restoring a wooland area and I can select a box of trees (the size of the boxes varies),handfuls of treeguards and handfuls of stakes to use with the guards (3 per guard)and the numbers of all three objects will match more often than not. And I often deal in hundreds. I don't store the guards and stakes in groups of any particular number - mostly they have been used before, and the numbers are random. These are just 2 examples but it happens all the time with most things I do. I have no particular ability with formal arithmetic and have'nt studied maths.

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Barbara
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 05:51 PM

I saw a quote recently where I think it was Istak Perleman was asked about playing violin with Albert Einstein, and said something like "Like all mathematicians, he was bad at counting" or maybe it was "he was bad at time".
Blessings,
Barbara

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Amos
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 05:58 PM

Those who are interested in a whole new angle on bump feeling should contact a representative of the Temple of the Golden Globes. We offer the necessary Braille techniques and training in sensitivity.


A

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Ebbie
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 06:57 PM

Wolfgang, You may be quoting from the study verbatim in which case it isn't your confusion I'm addressing. As usual, I expect I am missing something.

But first, you say: "Those of us with little or no aptitude (or, if you like, talent) for playing a musical instrument now have an excuse: our brains aren't built for it." Then you go on to say that the study's conclusion is that persistence is the reason for the musician's brain differences.

Which is it?

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 07:20 PM

I just got my daughter's cognitive abilities tested (IQ test)and her scores were quite divergent. 134 on some tests, 112 on others, very high score on spatial distribution test, low if pictures and social context were added to the mix. She is very frustrated a lot of the time (thus the testing), and this may explain some of it - different learning abilities in different areas.

I have a sneaky suspision that some of those high scores are so high because she is successful at those types of tasks and does them a lot. Still, even at 7 there are are distinct brain things going on. Maybe, she will be a musician!

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Gloredhel
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 08:17 PM

Musicians' brains are different. Well what do you know.

One of my music teachers, whom I am very close to, told me that she's give up dating non-musicians. "They just don't get it." Of the six music teachers I've had who were married, four were married to other musicians. Virtually all of my friends sing or play an instrument, even though in many cases I did not know that for some time after we became friends. As hard as I try, I don't get along well with most non-musicians.

I don't know what other tasks musicians as a whole are good at. My friends seem to be all over the board. One is double-majoring in music and English, another in music and mechanical engineering. Of my aquaintances who are music minors, some are pre-med, physics, biology, chemistry, or computer science, others in history, philosophy, Spanish, French, Classical languages, physical education, communications, or business. Some are very religious, others are not. Some are nice, some are jerks. The ones who are good musicians all at least have some sort of self-discipline, but other than that I see no correlation between our abilities outside music.

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 30 Oct 03 - 01:00 AM

"our aptitudes for the tasks that face us in life are a mixture of both - someone with no innate genetic ability can, with diligence become reasonably proficient at a task or vice versa. "

Ahh, that explains Johnny Howard's efforts as a politician...


I remember a while ago seeing something (or it could have been the ABC Radio Science Show - which case I heard it!) which mentioned that there was some empiracle evidence about musical physical practice and brains growth - babies show remarkable brain pathways growth in speech areas over three years. Also there was some research which showed something along the line of - that music scholars at a Conservatorium refleted the following - 3,000 hours of practice meant that they went on to beocme music teachers, 10,000 hours of proctice meant that went on to be performers... :-)

It took me about three years (even with previous musical experience) to grasp most of the physical cooridination to be able to play the Piano accordion to the extent of being satisfied that I was not just "mucking about"... :-)


Robin

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Wilfried Schaum
Date: 30 Oct 03 - 03:14 AM

I don't agree that bad old phrenology is coming back in a new shape. Here I see a totally different scientific approach to the problem.
Additional to practice I think that a certain predisposition is necessary for music, which can be enhanced by breeding. Best example in history is the family of musicians Bach whose acumen is the unforgettable master Johann Sebastian (NOT P.D.Q.!).
That there is a certain relation between music and mathematics was found out some millennia ago by the Greek philosopher Pythagoras. It is obvious to the eye and the ear when you press the frets of your guitar.

Wilfried

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Wilfried Schaum
Date: 31 Oct 03 - 09:15 AM

Brain Structures Differ between Musicians and Non-Musicians
Since I have no direct access to The Journal of Neuroscience, I can only give the abstract of the article as printed in the journal.
http://www.jneurosci.org/cgi/content/abstract/23/27/9240

Christian Gaser1,2 and Gottfried Schlaug1

1Department of Neurology, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02215, and 2Department of Psychiatry, University of Jena, D-07743 Jena, Germany

From an early age, musicians learn complex motor and auditory skills (e.g., the translation of visually perceived musical symbols into motor commands with simultaneous auditory monitoring of output), which they practice extensively from childhood throughout their entire careers. Using a voxel-by-voxel morphometric technique, we found gray matter volume differences in motor, auditory, and visual-spatial brain regions when comparing professional musicians (keyboard players) with a matched group of amateur musicians and non-musicians. Although some of these multiregional differences could be attributable to innate predisposition, we believe they may represent structural adaptations in response to long-term skill acquisition and the repetitive rehearsal of those skills. This hypothesis is supported by the strong association we found between structural differences, musician status, and practice intensity, as well as the wealth of supporting animal data showing structural changes in response to long-term motor training. However, only future experiments can determine the relative contribution of predisposition and practice.

Key words: musician; brain; morphometry; motor training; sensorimotor; gray matter
________________________________________________________________________
Received June 18, 2003; revised August 22, 2003; accepted August 26, 2003.

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: s&r
Date: 31 Oct 03 - 11:18 AM

Just nit-picking perhaps, but the Pythagorean method of establishing a scale is not the same as the exponential scale on the guitar fretboard see http://www.jimloy.com/physics/scale.htm

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Deckman
Date: 31 Oct 03 - 06:13 PM

This thread title caught my eye. I would like to add something and see if anyone else has noticed this: In my first life, I was VERY serious in my music studies. I took years of courses, private teachers, etc. And ... I hung around some very good, proffessional musicians. One thing that always amazed me, especially regarding symphoney orchestra musicians, was their attraction to, and uncanny ability in two areas: puns and words games.

For example, back in the 60's, it was very populiar to play a mind game, anytime you were driving long distances, called "Botachelli." Does anyone remember this?

It takes several players, as when the whole group is driving twelve hours to a gig, and you try to guess the word that "it" has chosen. There's a whole set of rules, simple really, but it's like mental chess. And ... it can keep you mentally occupied while driving hundreds of miles.

I've actually witnessed several musicians to keep this game going, over several days, during rehersals and the actual performances.

Are musicians the only ones quirky, or skilled enough, to pull this off? CHEERS, Bob

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Cluin
Date: 31 Oct 03 - 06:27 PM

Long-term inmates in prisons or mental institutions perhaps.   ;)

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Amos
Date: 31 Oct 03 - 08:23 PM

I've seen similar pastimes but also amongst musicians, even if amateurs.

A

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Wilfried Schaum
Date: 01 Nov 03 - 03:09 AM

s&r - naturally you are right, mine was the historic approach of dividing a string in halves to get the natural tones. Their height depends on the ground tone. The modern scale was established during the lifetime of J.S.B. who wrote his cycle "The Well Tempered Piano" to celebrate this invention.

Wilfried

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: M.Ted
Date: 01 Nov 03 - 11:22 AM

Musicians tend to come from families of musicians. In my teaching, I found that students who had musical relatives tended to grasp things more readily than those who didn't. Also found that there were those who had a knack and those who could only learn by diligent study and repitition--funny thing was that the ones with the knack could be less successful than the others--so there are many variables--

Subject: RE: Musician's brains different
From: Gloredhel
Date: 01 Nov 03 - 01:51 PM

Deckman--I know what you mean about the word games. My roommate, her sister, my boyfriend, and I are all music students in college, and when the four of us are in the same room, the word games are endless, with plays on French and Latin words as well as English, song and book titles, composer's names, anything really.

Our favorite is to take a phrase that someone else has used which is supposed to be figurative and respond as though we thought it was meant literally. It drives a lot of people crazy.

The four of us, and our music professors too, play a lot more word games than any of the English majors I know. The only group I've come across who can match musicians for playing with language are the philosophers.