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Music in the NICU
A friend who is a chaplain in a nearby hospital often sings to the premature infants in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). She does this because it just feels like the right thing to do. Don’t we always sing to babies to soothe and comfort them? And she notices that the babies immediately calm…
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The brain – and finding the beat
I attended a spring concert a few weeks ago that prompted me to think about rhythm, movement, and the brain. The concert was at a very small private school (pre-school through grade 4) and was titled “Poetry Everywhere.” It was a mix of absolutely charming poetry written and read by the students and songs they…
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I’m back – with a new book!
The Musician’s Brain isn’t defunct, although you may wonder where I have been for the past 2 years. Actually, I spent the Covid years writing a book, and The Musical Brain: what students, teachers, and performers need to know, will be released by Oxford on March 3. (Oxford is offering a discount to my blog…
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Inauguration Fanfares
Many of us feel a need to begin celebrating the inauguration of Joe Biden and Kamela Harris sooner rather than later. As we are all too well aware, inaugural events will be virtual due to the pandemic as well as to security concerns following the insurrection at the US Capitol on January 6. That doesn’t…
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Reimagining opera during the pandemic
In the current issue of The New Yorker, music critic Alex Ross writes about the multiple ways orchestras have found to reimagine their 2020-2021 seasons (“What Does It Mean to ‘Reimagine’ an Orchestra Season?”; online Nov. 30; print issue Dec 7). Performances have ranged from outdoor chamber concerts, to streamed concerts of live music played…
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Learning and memory: the role of sleep, exercise, and nutrition
There was a recent article in my local newspaper about students, stress, and learning. Unfortunately, the article didn’t mention sleep, because sleep is a crucial factor both for alleviating stress and for the encoding and consolidation of memory. Exercise and good nutrition also play a role in learning and memory. So while we tend to…