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From: Elaina Taylor
Date: 08 Oct 2007
Time: 17:47:12 -0500
Remote Name: 70.21.130.210
I saw Oliver Sacks speak as part of the New Yorker festival yesterday. He was talking about the affect of music on the brain primarily in people with aphasia, parkinson’s disease, traumatic brain injury and Alzheimer’s. In his new book “Musicophilia” (p. 252 and 253) he talks about how some of his patient’s with parkinson’s disease who presented with ataxic movements danced fluidly to music. However, the music played was, in his words, the “right” (p. 252) music – smooth, without breaks between successive notes, and with a well defined rhythm. Music with a rhythm that was too loud, dominating, or intrusive often overtook the patient. You mentioned singing in your paper. I am wondering if there is a certain “type” of music that enables people who stutter to sing more fluently? Obviously, if a person sings a familiar song, the more likely he/she is to be fluent, but I was curious about unfamiliar songs. Have you found any patterns in your work when you teach new songs? Thank you so much for an interesting and insightful paper.