Music

Recently I was reading Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain by the neurologist and storyteller Oliver Sacks. In it, he writes about how people experience music, or more to the point, how the brain experiences music. The stories are fascinating. For example, he writes that some people who are deaf or partially deaf, hear music "in their heads. " It's like the brain "decides" on its own to produce this music!

I read this with interest since for much of my life I have heard music "in my head" periodically although I am not deaf. Nor had I ever thought to mention it to anybody since it was infrequent and unobtrusive.

I was a musician/songwriter throughout my teens, twenties and thirties and occasionally still pick up my guitar, but music doesn't have the same place in my life as it did previously. And when I think about it now, it's possible that the less I play or listen to music, the more my brain decided to "play a tune." Hmmmm. Not sure about that; I'll have to pay attention.

It's interesting to think about the importance of music in our lives. How often do you give your linear thinking brain a rest and turn on the music?

Today I am going to make sure that listening to music is a part of my day. I may even play my beautiful Taylor guitar. But first, since I especially love songs that are in a language I don't know (for some odd reason), I am going to start out this morning listening to my new favorite artist, the Iroquois singer Joanne Shenandoah. If you haven't heard her before, treat yourself and get Peace & Power: Best of Joanne Shenandoah.