of the basal ganglia (the putamen), with the thalamus, pre-SMA, and SMA. Metric simple rhythms,
compared to complex and nonmetric rhythms, elicit increased activity in these areas. Moreover,
listening to unaccented isochronous rhythms generates internal subjective accents (pp. 35, 41-42).
This finding illuminates the familiar observation that we perceive a metric structure in the regular
dripping of waterdrops and the ticking of a clock.
Culture, development, and training
Brains of jazz musicians
Chakravarthy and Vuust (NM III no. 6, pp. 70-83) review MRI studies which show differences be-
tween the brain structures of musicians and non-musicians, and present their own MRI study of
brain morphology in 17 highly skilled jazz/rock musicians. Their results suggest that increased local
gray-matter density in motor and auditory areas are correlated to rhythmic ability (p. 81).
Musical expertise
Tervaniemi (NM III no. 18, pp. 151-156) reviews studies which compare the brain functions between
musicians and non-musicians and between musicians with different musical backgrounds. MEG
studies showed stronger response to piano sounds in musicians than in non-musicians, and showed
that trumpeters and violinists had enhanced response to the timbre of their own instrument (p. 153).
In an EEG study, Tervaniemi and colleagues compared the responses of musicians and non-musi-
cians to pitch deviations. They conducted two tests, a test of pre-attentive response while the par-
ticipants were reading a book, and a test of attentive response where the participants were asked
to indicate the sounds with deviant frequency. They found superiority in musicians in the attentive
task, but observed no difference during the reading condition. The researchers suggest that musical
expertise may exert its effects merely at attentive levels of processing and not necessarily at the pre-
attentive level. They have published a full report of their study (Tervaniemi et al. 2005).
Effects of training and culture
Wong et al. (NM III no. 19, pp. 157-163) discuss findings that reveal the effect of training and cultural
experiences on the auditory pathway. They draw attention to the fact that auditory response and pro-
cessing begin in the brain stem and continue in the thalamus and the auditory cortex. Their study of
the frequency-following response (FFR) in the brain stem showed that musicians exhibit enhanced
encoding of linguistic pitch at the level of the brain stem.
Another study, in which violinists and flutists listened to excerpts from Bach Partitas while
being scanned with fMRI, showed robust activation of a cerebral network of expertise, when each
group heard stimuli played on their own instrument. This network encompasses Brodmann Area 44,
auditory association cortex, frontal regions, and precentral gyrus (p. 160).
In the third study, three groups of non-musicians performed recognition and tension judgment
tasks, listening to excerpts of Western and Indian melodies. One group was monomusical Western,
another group monomusical Indian. Participants in the last group were bimusical, enculturated in
Western as well as Indian music. The monomusical groups responded differently to Indian and West-
ern music, the bimusical group did not. The authors conclude that people can acquire sensitivity to
complex auditory stimuli associated with multiple cultures simply through exposure and enculturation
(p. 162).
Deficits, disorders, therapy, and recovery
Autism spectrum disorders and music listening
Heaton and Allen (NM III no. 45, pp. 318-325) report studies of musical experience in autism spec-
trum disorders (ASD). They emphasize that it is a misunderstanding that persons with social disabil-
ities must be incapable of a full enjoyment of music. On the contrary, they find that autistic adults