How does the Mozart effect work? Why does Mozart's music reduce epileptic discharges in the brain, while Haydn's does not? How do the brains of the audience without musical training and professional musicians perceive music? We were looking for answers with the head of the Centre for Neuroscience of the Central European Institute of Technology (CEITEC), Professor Ivan Rektor.
How did you come up with the idea to examine the differences between the perception of music by laymen and trained musicians?
I need to mention in advance that I am absolutely untrained in music but I love music and enjoy listening to it. I thought of it while driving, when my wife and I can never agree on what kind of music to listen to. My wife is also a professor of neurology, but a long time ago she failed the conservatory admission test – luckily for neurology. Therefore, she perceives music completely differently than I do. When driving, I listen to classical music or jazz, and I do not mind it. However, she feels disturbed by it when driving because she analyses such music. So she listens to various trivial songs that get on my nerves. The fact that the brains of people with musical training process music differently is no discovery. But the impulse came from these situations.
How can such differences in perception be measured?
We use functional magnetic resonance imaging. The CEITEC based in Brno has a large Centre for Neuroscience which has two magnetic resonance imaging facilities intended only for research. This is a rarity in the world and they are the only ones in the Czech Republic. When we opened this centre a year ago, we included our programme in the research programmes. We measure brain activity in young professional musicians, students in their last years at the Conservatory, especially JAMU. And we compare them with people like me, people with no musical training.
Have you also tested musicologists? They have music analysis in their job description...
We need a homogeneous group linked through age and profession, so we have young musicians. And we compare them with the exact opposite.
Once, I underwent magnetic resonance imaging of the head and it was accompanied by a variety of noises and beats like a techno party...
It is the noise of magnetic resonance imaging and it was one of the biggest problems we had to solve. We needed music to get to the ears in really good quality.
What happens in the brain when a musical stimulus comes?
This study is conducted by my PhD student Tereza Pařilová. She is very well prepared for it due to the fact that she is a professional musician herself – she graduated in harp and played in symphony orchestras. In addition, she is a computer scientist, so an ideal person for this type of research. We all perceive music emotionally, it plays a role in everyone. But professionals process music cognitively, they analyse it. In that, their brains differ from non-musicians, and that is what we want to accurately identify. We have some hypotheses, but we must wait for them to be confirmed. Generally, you can say that large areas of the brain are activated while listening. Of course, auditory areas, but also areas associated with emotions.
But that no longer concerns differences in the perception of music based on musical training, correct?
Our next study is conducted here at St. Anne's Hospital Centre for Epilepsy. We have patients who receive electrode implants deep into the brain for diagnostic reasons. Those are super thin multi-contact electrodes that are used to scan brain activity directly, not from the surface of the head. We had these patients listen to Mozart's Sonata for Two Pianos, K. 448, compared with Haydn and monitored whether there were any differences. One of two studies that we are conducting in cooperation with the Institute of Instrument Technology deals exactly with how various areas of the brain communicate with each other while listening to music. And this is not about music professionals or non-professionals, but instead about those that suffer from epilepsy. Preliminary results indicate that there is strong communication in the so-called limbic system. It is the part of the brain where emotions are processed.
What are the results of the research of the brain of epilepsy patients so far?
The study on epilepsy is being conducted by Klára Štillová and we are trying to verify the so-called Mozart effect in it. It was examined with the aforementioned Sonata for Two Pianos in D Major. Improvements in some cognitive processes were identified in the 1990s while listening to it, and this concerned mainly spatial learning. However, American epileptologist John Hughes played this sonata for patients with epilepsy and he found out that it suppresses epileptic discharges in the EEG monitored on the surface of the head. This study was replicated and re-tested, and we wanted to verify if it is true. Again, we took advantage of the fact that we have electrodes inserted directly into the brain – scanning the surface of the head is not nearly as accurate. We compared eight minutes of Mozart and eight minutes of Haydn's Surprise Symphony. To our surprise, it really works. There was a significant difference in the suppression of epileptic discharges in the brain while listening to Mozart, while Haydn did not work.
How does the Mozart effect work?
It is probably related to the physical properties of the examined sonata. This effect was lost in its computer conversion for the violin, it was only effective when playing the piano. And Hughes compared the characteristics of the Mozart's composition with the works of Haydn, Bach, Wagner and Bruckner, and, in his opinion, Mozart's sonata differs significantly in interval repetition. There are many repetitions in it. And he attributed the essence of influencing the brain function to it. There are also notions that there may be some harmony of rhythmic processes in the brain with the rhythm of music but I do not dare to comment on that.
Is it not convenient or comfortable for the brain when it can come back to familiar things?
I don't know. But there is a so-called reward system in the brain, and the transmitter is dopamine. It is a system that also works in addictions. This system is active when listening to music, which is not surprising. But it is also active at the moment when you are expecting to hear music. This could explain why music is so universal. Why basically everyone is able to perceive some music.
What music do you test on volunteers in the first research project – Mozart and Haydn as well?
That project is different. Our goal is to eliminate as much emotion as possible and focus on the cognitive side of things. Therefore, each research participant brings a short segment of a composition that excites them, which has a strong impact on them emotionally. And then they listen to it in the magnetic resonance imaging facility. As a control, we use music that has the same effect on someone else in the group. So we compare listening to these two kinds of music and the resting state of the brain.
If you play a completely random song to someone – could it be measured somehow to find out whether they like it?
That has not been studied, but probably not. I can imagine such an experiment but I am not sure it would be successful.
What does an author, who is not as nice as Mozart, do with the brain? Perhaps Schönberg, Bartók?
Some professionals chose such music, Shostakovich was chosen several times. I think that it is not pleasant music for a person with no musical training. For example, yesterday I was at Widmann's Violin Concerto and it took me a long time until I started enjoying listening to it. But my wife was excited the entire time. I started to like the concert in the middle. Or, more precisely, it caught my attention, especially the virtuosity of the soloist. However, my wife felt perfect harmony with the orchestra and such things that I am not able to analyse.
And would it be possible to precisely measure music that is popular because it is "correct"? Correct in the sense that the brain is connected to it?
I can imagine that the activation of limbic regions is different in music that I like or dislike. Nobody has tried it, however, and it is also a question of the sensitivity of the methods used for the measurement.
It seems that you explore completely different things in music than musicians.
Last year in September, we organised the European Congress of Clinical Neurosurgery in Brno with more than 600 participants. I organised a symposium on Music in the Brain during the congress. There was a lecture by Professor Eckart Altenmüller, who is a neurologist but works at the Hanover Music and Theatre School. He specialises in the study of the brain in relation to music. And there are many centres worldwide that specialise in it. However, we asked very specific questions and discussed them with our colleagues from abroad before launching the research.
In which topics do your colleagues abroad specialise?
For example, Professor Altenmüller specialises in the so-called professional dystonia of musicians. A brain disorder may occur when fingers curl up when intensively playing a musical instrument. Professor Altenmüller examined which areas of the brain are responsible for it. A typical professional dystonia is the writer's cramp, but there is an analogy for musicians. We treat these disorders in our Centre for Abnormal Movements and Parkinsonism.
How often do musicians with these problems get to you?
Rarely, I do not know the exact number. These are usually specific disorders which probably originate from overworking.
Did you teach yourself to play a musical instrument?
I tried to learn to play the piano for a year but it did not work. My wife used to play the piano and my daughter is also learning, she will finish children's music school soon. But I suffer from some kind of amusia and I am unable to reproduce a tone. I cannot sing a single song, I only know a few vulgar worn-out songs.
What are your musical preferences, what do you like to listen to?
I listen to classical music and jazz. My upper time limit in classical music is Bohuslav Martinů, but not everything. In concert, I like Shostakovich, but I would probably not listen to him at home.
Sometimes it seems to me that lay people end with music where professionals begin.
It shifts. When I was a child, any music of the 20th century was unacceptable to me. My father listened to Beethoven, Brahms, and that is how I grew up. Gradually, with age, I make progress with the music of the 20th century as well.
How do you feel about the Brno musical life, are you happy with it?
I am very happy with it, but I do not have time for it. We have a subscription package for the Philharmonic Orchestra – mainly because it forces us to go to the concerts. And there are great things at the JazzFestBrno. Carmina Burana at the hockey arena was quite a horrific experience for me. I had never been to an ice hockey game so I did not know what I was getting myself into.
Prof. MUDr. Ivan Rektor, CSc, FCMA, FANA – neurologist, 1st Clinic of Neurology of the School of Medicine, Masaryk University, and the St. Anne's University Hospital; Head of the CEITEC Centre of Neurology➚
