ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses different types of imagery and their interactions with other cognitive functions, specifically aspects of memory, and their neural signatures. It argues that a supportive form of imagery is of crucial importance to the generation of perceptual predictions, which can be considered to be central to the cognition of music listening. The experience of music, like many other perceptual and cognitive processes, can be argued to largely take place internally; air pressure waves are not necessarily music until they hit the ear, get processed in the brain and body, and are interpreted as music. Specifically relating to music, imagery processes have been put forward as being crucial to active music listening, arguing that inner representations play a central role in the experience of perceiving music. One way to be more precise about the specific role of imagery in the functions is to make distinctions between different types of imagery, which could potentially apply to any sensory modality.
