Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain

For this assignment I chose to read Musicophilia by Oliver Sacks. This is a longer book, and I haven’t had the chance to finish it. Because if this I will be writing about what I have read and what I have found most interesting.  Dr. Sacks prefaces the book by explaining how music isn’t an evolutionary trait for humans as it is for other species. But music is important to us culturally and emotionally. Science on music and the brain is relatively new, only really being published in the 1980s. One of the stories that Dr. Sacks writes about is of Dr. Tony Cicoria. Dr. Cicoria is an orthopedic surgeon. He was in great health when one day he was struck by lightning. During this accident he had an out of body, almost spiritual, experience. After recovering fully, Dr. Cicoria had an overwhelming need to listen to piano compositions. This turned into a fascination of learning the piano. He because to dream about music he created. Dr. Cicoria’s life did a complete 180, since before the incident he did not really pay much attention to classical piano and hand played since taking a few lessons as a child. This new obsession and need to play the piano was all encompassing; he had to learn to play the piano while also trying to write the song he heard in his dream. I will continue to read this book, and then I will update this page.