ABSTRACT

This chapter reviews brain evidence on cultural adaptation to a musical system. The evidence suggests that one important factor allowing successful musical interactions among musicians and between the musician and the listener is a common sharing of cultural conventions. The chapter proposes a new hypothesis according to which brain-to-brain coupling following cultural adaptation might be a necessary prerequisite for a successful musical interaction. The advent of modern neuroimaging techniques, and particularly high-resolution electroencephalography (EEG), whole-head magnetoencephalography (MEG), transcranial magnetic resonance imaging (TMS), and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), has attracted scientists to investigate music as a biological phenomenon. Results extended the initial observations obtained with brain-lesioned patients identifying brain regions responsible for several types of musical skills. The accumulating research on neuroplastic changes after musical training has opened the avenue for investigating the source of the variations in brain mechanisms among individuals rather than their constancy.