Beethoven's Anvil: Music In Mind And Culture

By William Benzon

"A provocative and persuasive treatise." --Howard Gardner This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0465015433
• ISBN13: 9780465015436
• Release Date: October 2001
• Publisher: Basic Books
• Length: 352 Pages
• Weight: 1.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.4" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

A lucid conjecture about music and foundations of society

It took a cognitive scientist who is also a musician to notice an obvious but scientifically ignored linkage: making music together is something that enables humans to improvise cooperation on the fly. Benzon uses his own experiences as a musician to tie the extensive citations in biology, psychology, sociology, and economics into a sense-making narrative. Benzon believes that when people make music together they create a kind of shared brain-state that exists in no single head, but emerges from the synchronized communications of a group. and uses an impressive body of knowledge to back up his case. Benzon might be proved right and he might be proved wrong, but he uses solid science and creative conjecture to make a highly readable as well as reasonable case.

Explores links between music and brain functioning

Music and culture are discussed, not with the usual artistic focus, but with a healthy blend of science and sociology added to the mix. Is music a luxury, an art, or a biological need? William Benzon's Beethoven's Anvil explores links between music and brain functioning, using the history of music and its evolution to draw some important arguments about music's importance to brain functioning as a whole.