Former Globe and Mail health reporter Adriana Barton blends neuroscience and history with her own personal reflections in her new book Wired for Music
Barton picked up a cello for the first time at age five, and for the next 17 years, she devoted herself to drawing out perfect sounds from the instrument. Her steadfast pursuit of a career as a classical musician earned her awards, the opportunity to train with esteemed teachers and the chance to perform in illustrious venues, including Carnegie Hall.
The pressure to succeed as a cellist was ingrained in me at such a young age. I was enrolled in a formal conservatory, and although I didn’t know it at the time, it was almost a Faustian bargain, where in exchange for all this free training – by that, I don’t mean a lesson a week; I mean theory, orchestra, et cetera with high school students when I was in primary school – I was expected to devote myself to the life of a professional musician-in-training.
But the case you make isn’t for music to be used to treat this or that specific health issue. Rather, the reasons to tap into music are much broader. But another reason is the way most of us are introduced to music-making as children in Western cultures. In the brain, there’s something that some people call the “punishment circuit,” the periventricular system. And when that is activated, it pumps us up with adrenaline, preparing us for fight or flight because there’s a threat. That actually inhibits or short-circuits the pleasure-reward circuitry.
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