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Intro.5 Music and the Brain: Processing Songs—Music and Lyrics
All songs spring from songwriters’ information-processing brains. Great songwriters reveal, in the music and lyrics of their songs, an intuitive understanding of the forces within the human brain that enable humans to create both music and lyrics. That’s the subject of Chapter 1.
Songs become timeless classics if they tap into shared human universals, aspects of evolved behaviour that have not changed in tens or hundreds of thousands of years. As you go through this book, you’ll learn how to apply insights about how your brain works in the process of creating and performing your songs. And how your listeners’ brains work when they hear your songs.
Is it tough to learn?
In a word, nah. It ain’t rocket science.
Here’s the thing. You can’t separate biology from the arts. That includes music. The human brain’s built-in receptors for patterns and sequences become activated at several levels when the brain senses patterns in melodies and chords and rhythm and lyrics. How Music REALLY Works! shows you how to exploit your brain’s adaptation for music in your songwriting and performing technique.
You’ll probably write much better songs, memorable, powerful songs, once you gain an understanding of how the brain processes music and lyrics, and the emotional connections it makes. (You’ll perform better, too).
That does not mean you have to memorize all the technical details in this book. Instead, you only need to understand the essence of what you’re reading. You can go through the material at whatever pace you’re comfortable with. No need to rush. Your brain will retain the gist of the material that interests you, the stuff you find yourself having fun with—especially the territory that’s new for you. When you’re done, of course you’ll need to look up specific details from time to time to refresh your memory. But you don’t need to memorize lengthy passages to acquire useful information.
The oft-quoted philosopher, Huckleberry Finn, best sums up where you’re headed in the following pages, and why:
I reckon I got to light out for the Territory ahead of the rest because Aunt Sally she’s going to adopt me and sivilize me, and I can’t stand it. I been there before.