How listening to a Tango lights up the whole brain
- Music For Wellbeing
- Jun 7, 2024
- 1 min read
Updated: Jun 10, 2024
In 2011 a study was carried out by a group of Finnish researchers showing how wide networks in the brain are activated during music listening.
fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) recorded brain responses of individuals listening to an Argentinian Tango, sophisticated computer algorithms analysed the musical features of the Tango and brain responses and musical features were compared to show how different musical features (pulse, rhythm, timbre etc) activated emotional, motor and creative areas of the brain.
A animation was created based on the fMRI and computer modeling. You can see the brain dancing the Tango in that animation here.
Journal Reference:
Vinoo Alluri, Petri Toiviainen, Iiro P. Jääskeläinen, Enrico Glerean, Mikko Sams, Elvira Brattico. Large-scale brain networks emerge from dynamic processing of musical timbre, key and rhythm. NeuroImage, 2011; DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2011.11.019