Grey Matter & Music

So I have been doing some research for this blog and the sheer volume of material written on the topic of music and it's psychological link to humanity is staggering.
It will definitely require a "free" weekend of study to consume just a portion of it all.

But I did come across a very interesting article regarding how we have come to process music and why we love the type of music that we do.

The article, written by Farhad Manjoo, is based on the book, This Is Your Brain on Music, by Daniel Levitin. (The book has been downloaded by your truly and will be consumed this weekend)
But I wanted to hit the high points of the article that I found extremely interesting, and I think you might as well.

Now we all have "our music". Whether it's old school rap, hair band metal (me), classic rock, British rock et. al. When we hear a particular song we are instantly taken back to a point in time that is memorable for us. Maybe it was the high school prom; maybe it was the song on the radio when you had your first date. The possibilities are endless. But there's a reason why we are so connected to that music, it's far more complex than simply stating, "I like this band."
Levitin, a neuroscientist, explains how our brains process audible information, "Imagine that you stretch a pillow case tightly across the open end of a bucket, and different people throw ping pong balls at it front different distances. Each person can throw as many ping pong balls as she likes, and as often as she likes. Your job is to figure out - just by looking at how the pillow case moves up and down - how many people are there, who they are, and whether they are walking toward you, walking away from you, or are standing still. This is analogous to what the auditory system has to contend with in making identifications of auditory objects in the world, using only the movement of the eardrum as a guide."

He also makes another conclusion from his research; that the music we listen to during our cognitively formative years (pre-teen and teen) is the music that will stick with us forever. There's a reason you call it, "your parents' music".
These years, by and large, are very emotional times, hormones running rampant and all. We tend to remember the music of this time because. "we tend to remember things....because our amygdala and neurotransmitters act in concert to 'tag' memories as something important."
So please, please, choose your music carefully young people! You're going to have it in your head for a very long time! (Remember Milli Vanilli?)

I will ask forgiveness from the music gods for this video at a later time....

Music is now, and always will be a part of humanity. There has never been a human culture that was without music of some sort. Let that sink in....

I hope that this hasn't been too much a flashback of your days in anatomy & physiology, but rather, my hope is that you will better understand the importance of music in our world.