The Music Instinct: How Music Works and Why We Can´t Do Without It
Philip Ball
Why have all human cultures - today and throughout history - made music? Why does music excite such rich emotion? How do we make sense of musical sound?
These are questions that have, until recently, remained mysterious. Now The Music Instinct explores how the latest research in music psychology and brain science is piecing together the puzzle of how our minds understand and respond to music. Ranging from Bach fugues to nursery rhymes to heavy rock, Philip Ball interweaves philosophy, mathematics, history and neurology to reveal why music moves us in so many ways.
Without requiring any specialist knowledge, The Music Instinct will both deepen your appreciation of the music you love, and open doors to music that once seemed alien, dull or daunting, offering a passionate plea for the importance of music in education and in everyday life.
'You'll never listen to music the same way again' - Independent
Product Details
About Philip Ball
Reviews for The Music Instinct: How Music Works and Why We Can´t Do Without It
Sunday Times
Exemplary... In contemplating the mysteries of music we are also contemplating the mystery of ourselves... Ball, thankfully, doesn't try to provide any easy answers, but rather sends the reader back to the music a better listener
Observer
This is a truly fascinating and eye-opening account of a phenomenon so commonplace we barely think about it, yet one which is also mind-bogglingly complicated. Once you've read The Music Instinct, you'll never listed to music the same way again
Independent
A musical experience in itself...his love of the subject is abundantly evident.. His mastery of many scientific disciplines is a delight
Daily Telegraph
Impressively engaging...it will be the rare music lover that does not come away without having learned many interesting things
Guardian
Ball....proves as comfortable discussing the science of music as its cultural and artistic dimensions... This thought-provoking book answers many questions, and leaves a few hanging tantalisingly behind as well
Financial Times
Remarkable capacity to use words to open our ears
Sunday Telegraph
This book surveys current thinking and tells you why music rocks
Iain Finlayson
The Times
Bestriding with equal ease the very different disciplines of philosophy, mathematics, history and neurology, the author answers com amore the questions posed in the subtitle of this important book. A remarkable achievement.
Classic FM Magazine
The author breaks new (to me) ground
Sunday Telegraph