The World in Six Songs

by Daniel J. Levitin

Book Overview

The author of the New York Times bestseller (six weeks and counting) and Los Angeles Times Book Award Nominee This Is Your Brain on Music (more than 170,000 copies in print) tunes us in to six evolutionary musical forms that provide a window into the human soul. An unprecedented blend of science and art, Daniel Levitinas debut, This Is Your Brain on Music, delighted readers with an exuberant guide to the neural impulses behind those songs that make...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0525950737
• ISBN13: 9780525950738
• Release Date: August 2008
• Publisher: Dutton Books
• Length: 368 Pages
• Weight: 1.19 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 6.5" x 9.1"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

This could be one of the most interactive books you will read.

If you enjoyed his, This Is Your Brain On Music, here is the next one to extend your learning. It is about six types of songs and how they perhaps came about as we evolved The six fundamental forms: * knowledge, * friendship, * religion, * joy, * comfort, and * love His work fascinates me as he weaves songs that I grew up with along with many others I do not know of, to illustrate exactly his points. As he makes his point I hear the song(s) playing in my head to really reinforce the idea. And then he shows you exactly why that is happening with the scientific proof. This could be one of the most interactive books you will read. Learning should be this much fun all the time. This book will really have use to you if you lead people, sell to people and/or need cross cultural awareness. [...]

An entertaining and informative examination of the human brain and culture as revealed by music

Daniel Levitin is both a rock musician and a cognitive scientist. That is, he looks at how the brain behaves as you perceive things. Music is one of those interesting puzzles that allows people like Levitin to see the brain behave in ways different than our other everyday behaviors, even speech. He wrote an interesting book "This Is Your Brain On Music" that I liked and reviewed. You can see it here: This Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession In this book, the author uses what he knows about music (almost always popular music) and the brain to speculate about what these imply about human evolution and how our development as a species and in our various social cultures was influenced by music and how these inner human qualities influence the expression of music. The title's use of "six songs" is a bit misleading, though it is nicely poetic and provocative at the same time. Levitin is really talking about six TYPES of songs. The six categories are Friendship, Joy, Comfort, Knowledge (teaching and memory songs), Religion, and Love. Also included in each of these six are the opposites. So, really it is twelve categories. Nor does he deal with purely instrumental music much, or the uses of music that fall outside of these categories. Art music, for example, he assumes is included in what he writes. But the kinds of music he writes about, while art, are not art music any more than butchers and surgeons are the same because they both cut meat. Nor does he deal with categories such as introspection, abstract instrumental music (non-programmatic music or absolute music), or complicated forms that deal with many of these categories (such as opera, passion plays (they are more than just religion), or even Broadway musicals). Heck, what about Ralph Sampson playing the banjo in something like "Cuttin' the Cornbread"? It isn't really telling you about cornbread. We enjoy it and it makes us happy, but it doesn't fit into these categories anymore than a Bach Fugue or Suite or Stravinsky's Piano Sonata does. While you can lump all kinds of pieces into these broad categories, after awhile they contain so many disparate items that the names become somewhat useless. For example, where would you put Schubert's "Erlkönig"? As fear (the opposite of comfort)? Well, it is also fantasy, drama, it also has the father and son connection where the father fails to save the son despite his best efforts because he cannot see, comprehend, or believe in what the son sees. Or maybe it was just a fever after all and the son's dealing with the phantom was just the son's hallucination. Or what about "Auf dem wasser zu singen"? Is this merely about ecstasy? Or is it about the glorious sensory impressions of being on a boat on the water in the light of sunny day? This is a song about mortality and existence but isn't about love, comfort, religion. Maybe you could put it in the joy category. But I think that it would be stretching it qu

Songs in the key of life

This fascinating book explores the powerful force music has played in shaping our common humanity. It's evolution, with a backbeat. Author Levitin makes the case that six basic types of songs have existed throughout the course of human history, all over the world. Mankind, apparently, shares a soundtrack. The six broad categories of music are songs about friendship, joy, comfort, knowledge, religion and love. Each has a different function, but all serve to bind us together. They make us stronger as a species. Levitin, a musician and scientist, cites anthropologists, evolutionary biologists, neurosurgeons, psychologists, and many famous musicians in this book. He includes lyrics from a great range of songs, including "At Seventeen," "The Hokey Pokey," "I Walk the Line," "Twist and Shout," and "Log Blues" from Ren & Stimpy. Music can be so evocative. A snippet of song can take you back to the exact moment you heard it in childhood or high school or whenever. It's like there is a direct link that exists in the human brain between music and memory. This books tells us that Americans spend more money on music than they do on prescription drugs or sex, and the average American hears more than five hours of music per day. It's obviously important to us. After reading The World in Six Songs, you'll have a much better idea why. Here's the chapter list: 1. Taking It from the Top or "The Hills Are Alive..." 2. Friendship or "War (What Is It Good For)?" 3. Joy or "Sometimes You Feel Like a Nut" 4. Comfort or "Before There Was Prozac, There Was You" 5. Knowledge or "I Need to Know" 6. Religion or "People Get Ready" 7. Love or "Bring `Em All In"

Music is often better than words

As the drum, drum, drumming in the air grew louder the usual pregame roar in Ball One Ballpark in Phoenix softened and attention swung to a pre-game show by the Bashas' Bears High School drumline. They are good. The driving pulse of a drumline, like the beat of a powwow drum circle, is captivating, dynamic, addictive and hypnotic. Music and its rhythms enchant and entrap our souls, and this book offers a fascinating look at "Why" it has such impact. There are many books about music, but this is a fresh look by a skilled writer about why instead of merely the how, what, when and where of musical notes. Unlike usual textbooks which are heavy on being textbooks and light on understanding, Levitin has experience enough to explain his subject. Humans are said to be the only species that laughs at itself, or needs to; likewise, we are the only species that creates original music, or has the ability to do so, or perhaps the need, and certainly the desire. Levitin, a professional musician and successful record producer, now runs a laboratory for music perception, cognition and expertise at McGill University. He is a rare academic, solidly grounded in the everyday world of his specialty instead of mere bookish theory. He is a professional who relates to his fellow artists and thus knows how to express basic ideas and themes in words everyone can understand. Six songs? I'd add a few, such as the Bears' drumline. Even though a drumline is not melodic, it has a powerful rhythmic appeal. It's an example of how music is more than notes on a scale, and how basic the appeal of rhythm and music is to our senses. Levitin offers some very basic ideas to understand our need and appeal for music, using wit, charm and personal anecdotes. He's been there and walked the walk ... in his case played the notes professionally ... it gives his thoughts and ideas a perfect pitch. Exquisitely written, it is really about ourselves because we are such a musical species. It makes me wonder: What if humans had never learned to talk, but merely communicate through music? It seems far more reasonable than merely talking without understanding -- at which we're all too expert. What then the Bears' drumline? Their rhythms are among the most powerful ideas ever expressed. Like Irish step dancing, a powerful expression of unity without using a word, music can be a dynamic expression of human emotions, ideas and spirit. Fortunately, Levitin is admirably skilled in his use of words; every bit as good as the Bears' drumline or Beethoven's Sixth.