Posted on May 6th 2011 by Ingrid Piller, Language on the Move
On The Science Show they recently had a program about how unfamiliar sounds, rhythms and tonalities can drive people crazy. I learnt that neuroscientists have been experimenting with the idea that when confronted with unfamiliar musical patterns the brain releases dopamine, which in large quantities can cause schizophrenia (in small quantities it makes you happy). As a striking example they cited Igor Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, which when first performed in 1913, led to violent reactions in the audience and rioting in Paris. In a book called Proust was a Neuroscientist, Jonah Lehrer in 2007 first proposed that the reason for the violence was that Stravinsky’s use of asymmetrical rhythms, percussive dissonances, polyrhythms and polytonality was so new at the time that no one at the opera had ever heard anything like it. Read more...