Rhythms and Neurons: How Music Shapes the Brain's Internal Rhythms

What happens when the drummer for the Grateful Dead teams up with an international tabla master and a couple of cutting-edge neuroscientists? Or when opera diva Renée Fleming joins forces with researchers and music educators? Through the Sound Health Initiative, Ph.D.s and performers from diverse fields have been digging into the question of how music affects the brain, and they are finding that rhythm and music have far-reaching effects that start in infancy.

Here are some findings presented at the recent Sound Health Conference, attended by members of the Music Together Worldwide research team.

• Speech and singing both have rhythms that enable us to organize information. It’s easy to recognize the rhythms of beating hearts or ticking clocks, but we are less aware of the rhythms that underlie talking and social interactions. Because they have regular timing, the rhythms of speech and singing enable our brains to organize incoming content and predict when important information is on its way.
• Singing, even more than speech, soothes and relieves stress. Parents naturally speak to and sing to babies, as the inherent rhythms help regulate physical and emotional states. However, studies suggest that singing keeps infants happier for twice as long as talking. Since the benefits of singing to babies are long-lasting and stress-reducing, try singing instead of speaking the next time you try to soothe your little one.
• Making music with babies makes a big difference in their brains. Babies 6- to 12-months-old whose families participated in a music class showed more significant brain differences than babies who did not receive these live music-making experiences. The music class babies’ brains exhibited earlier and more pronounced responses to sound, and the babies were more easily soothed, showed less crying and distress, and smiled and laughed more.
• Tapping on the beat is a complex, learned skill. You hear music and begin tapping to the beat. It seems almost like a reflex, but your brain has done some incredible work to make that happen. The brain creates internal rhythms that synchronize the auditory (hearing) and motor (movement) centers of the brain, enabling you to respond in a coordinated way to music. In fact, this happens even when you are just “thinking” the music (audiating).
• Moving to the beat of music affects how children predict and organize the world. As children’s brains develop internal rhythms, children are more able to organize incoming information and respond in appropriate ways (such as seeing when a person is in distress and offering help, and in hearing when it’s their turn to speak and engaging in conversation). Exposure to coordinated rhythms in the environment—such as moving to music—help the brain establish these crucial internal rhythms. When this development does not happen, language-learning (spoken and written) and sensory organization are at risk. Giving children daily experiences of music and rhythm support the development of these skills.