Music & The Brain

  • Music & Emotion,  Music & The Brain,  Music Medicine & Therapy

    Music, emotion and the brain

    Hello Dear Reader This week has been one of the busiest of my life. I sold my London flat, bought a house back in my wonderful home town of York, and of course published my baby. You Are The Music was very briefly the number one selling music book on Amazon last week, a fact that still astonishes and humbles me. I really enjoy the idea that I am making a contribution to music, however small. I have rarely been so proud and grateful in my life: thank you, Dear Reader. Now that the book is out there in the big wide world I am starting to hear what people…

  • Earworms,  Music & Memory,  Music & The Brain

    A brain basis for musical hallucinations

      Hello Dear Reader, I hope your January is going well. We are experiencing an unusually mild winter here in Switzerland so far. Very little snow has reached Luzern, which stands 400m above sea level. But at least I can now see snow on the mountains (including the stunning Mount Pilatus) from my office window, and very lovely it looks too. Today I have been reading a new article (in press) in Cortex which claims to have identified a brain basis or at least a brain based explanation for musical hallucinations (MH). My interest was peaked – perhaps this might give a first clue about a brain basis for earworms?…