This Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession

Throughout This Is Your Brain on Music, Levitin emphasizes that music is a common aspect of all humans and human civilizations both today and throughout history. Although modern Western culture distinguishes between professional musicians and amateurs/listeners, music originally evolved as a common social activity in which everyone could engage. Almost all humans have innate and highly advanced music-listening and music-analyzing skills, even if they have not been educated in the jargon or techniques of formal music theory.

Levitin’s presentation of music as something that unites all humans regardless of their level of education reinforces the values and goals of his work as a popular science author. Just as popular science diminishes the divide between ordinary people and cutting-edge scientists, Levitin’s insistence that music is a universal aspect of being human connects the general public to the world of music. He describes all humans as “expert listeners” and notes how difficult it is for computers to replicate some of the automatic skills that almost all humans have (e.g., metrical extraction, identification of timbre, and recognition of melody). In addition, Levitin emphasizes that until recent centuries, music was predominantly a communal human activity in which everyone participated and often involved dance.