This "Little Organ Fugue" is a fine example of many musical
"terms". There is a statement (opening) followed by various
repetitions, development, transition, secondary theme, key
change
(modulation) big recapitulation, and closing, all in three
minutes and forty seconds. AND, it did not suffer too
terribly in the midi (mechanical) translation. The music
stands on its own! Not much more music has been written in
so little time! And, when heard "live", even on a "simple"
piano, there is a lot of expressed emotion!
Bach has been imitated and copied, but it is NEVER as good
as the original. (I am aware of a single exception! However,
it is still, original, Bach!)
Thank you, JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH for giving THE WORLD so much!
Listening to Bach as well as to Mozart can be very fulfilling!
"LISTENING" is the key word!
Please, read on.
(November 9, 1998)
From the Los Angeles Times
By ROBERT LEE HOTZ
Times Science Writer
"STUDY SUGGESTS MUSIC MAY SOMEDAY
HELP REPAIR BRAIN"
FINDINGS: Melody, harmony and rhythm stimulate areas
responsible for memory, other basic activities.
 he music that makes the foot tap, the
fingers snap and the pulse quicken stirs the brain at its most fundamental levels
suggesting that scientists one day may be able to retune damaged
minds by exploiting rhythm harmony and melody, according to new
research presented Sunday.
Exploring the neurobiology of music, researchers discovered
direct evidence that music stimulates specific regions of the
brain responsible for memory, motor control, timing and
language. For the first time, researchers also have located
specific areas of mental activity linked to emotional responses
to music.
In the long run, music could become a way of retooling brains
afflicted with a variety of emotional disorders, the researchers
said.
"That"s our goal," said neuroscientist Anne Blood, who conducted
the study at McGill University in Montreal. "You can activate
different parts of the brain, depending on what music you listen
to. So music can stimulate parts of the brain that are
underactive in these disorders. Over time, we could retrain the
brain in these disorders."
The findings, presented at a meeting of the Society for
Neuroscience in Los Angeles, underscore how music -- as an
almost universal language of mood, emotion, and desire --
orchestrates a wide variety of neural systems to cast its
evocative spell.
"Undeniably, there is a biology of music," said Harvard
University Medical School neurobiologist Mark Jude Tramo.
"There is no question that there is specialization within the
human brain for the processing of music. Music is biologically
part of human life, just as music is aesthetically part of
human life."
In a series of new studies made public Sunday, researchers found
that the brain:
RESPONDS DIRECTLY TO HARMONY. Using a medical PET scanner to
monitor changes in neural activity, neuroscientists at McGill
discovered that different parts of the brain involved in emotion
are activated depending on whether the music is pleasant or
dissonant. "Everyone knows music can produce powerful emotional
effects. This suggests different emotions are represented in
different parts of the brain." Blood said.
INTERPRETS WRITTEN MUSICAL NOTES AND SCORES IN AN AREA ON THE
BRAIN'S RIGHT SIDE. That region corresponds to an area on the
opposite side of the brain known to handle written words and
letters. So, in studying the brains of expert musicians,
researchers uncovered an anatomical link between music and
language. "We are guessing [the area] is involved in the visual
processing of the score itself," said Lawrence Parsons at the
University of Texas in San Antonio. "On the left the same area
is involved in reading."
GROWS IN RESPONSE TO MUSICAL TRAINING THE WAY A MUSCLE RESPONDS
TO EXERCISE. In a study of classically trained musicians,
researchers at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston
discovered that male musicians have significantly larger brains
than men who have not had extensive musical training. The area
of the brain called the cerebellum, which contains about 70% of
the brain's neurons, was about 5% larger in expert male
musicians. Researchers, however, found no such size increase in
the brains of female musicians, but said they may not have
studied enough women to be certain.
"Musicians are not just born with these differences," said Dr.
Gottfried Schlaug, the neurologist who conducted the research.
The cerebellum grows as a result of the constant practice of the
virtuoso motor skills needed to play an instrument, he said.
Overall, music seems to involve the brain at almost every level.
Even allowing for cultural differences in musical tastes, the
researchers found evidence of music's remarkable power to affect
neural activity no matter where they looked in the brain, from
primitive regions found in all animals to more recently evolved
regions thought to be distinctively human.
"We find that harmony, melody and rhythm had distinct patterns
of brain activity. They involved both the right and left sides
of the brain," Parsons said.
Melody affects both sides of the brain equally. Harmony and
rhythm seem to activate the left side of the brain more strongly
than the right side.
The neural mechanisms of music may have originally developed as
a way of communicating emotion as a precursor to speech, the
researchers suggested, offering insights into how the mind
integrates sensory information with emotion and meaning.
Already, researchers are looking for ways to harness the power
of music to change the brain.
Preliminary research in laboratory animals and humans suggests
that music may play some role in enhancing intelligence.
Indeed, so seductive is the possibility that music can boost a
child's IQ that politicians in Florida, Georgia and other states
are lobbying for schoolchildren to be exposed regularly to
Mozart sonatas, although such research has yet to be replicated
or confirmed.
The scientists Sunday said the new research could help the
clinical practice of neurology, including cognitive
rehabilitation. As a therapeutic tool, for example, some
doctors already use music to help rehabilitate stroke patients.
Surprisingly, some stroke patients who have lost their ability
to speak retain their ability to sing, and that opens an avenue
for therapists to retrain the brain's speech centers.
"Patients sing what they want to say and some improve their
fluency," Parsons said.
END OF LA TIMES ARTICLE
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