McMaster launches new Institute for Music and the Mind
[img_inline align=”right” src=”http://padnws01.mcmaster.ca/images/Trainor_Laurel.jpg” caption=”Laurel Trainor, the new director of the McMaster Institute for Music and the Mind.”]The newly formed McMaster Institute for Music and the Mind will present a unique public event aimed at bringing together the art and the science of music.
Professor Glenn Schellenberg will discuss new research findings that reveal how listening to music and taking music lessons affects intellectual abilities such as language, spatial ability, and mathematics, while renowned musicians Valerie Tryon (piano), Mary Lou Fallis (soprano), Suzanne Shulman (flute), David Gerry (flute) and the John Laing Singers illustrate with musical examples.
“In development, connections are made between neurons in the brain according to how they are stimulated by incoming sensory information,” says professor Laurel Trainor, director of the McMaster Institute for Music and the Mind. “The musical experiences of children taking music lessons have a direct effect on how the brain gets wired up.”
The concert and lecture will take place Saturday, Nov. 19 at 8 p.m. at the First Unitarian Church, 170 Dundurn Street South, Hamilton. Admission is free but seating is limited. To reserve tickets call 905-525-9140 ext. 28621 or e-mail mimm@mcmaster.ca.
On Nov. 8, 2005, the Senate of McMaster University approved the creation of the McMaster Institute for Music and the Mind.
The Institute is unique in the world in its interdisciplinary approach and reach. As part of the Faculty of Science, it will bring together some of the best minds from the faculties of engineering, health sciences, humanities, science, and social science, many of whom are funded by such granting agencies as the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
The Institute's vision is to integrate the arts and sciences through the scientific study of music. It will probe questions about how music gets encoded in the brain, how children learn music, the beneficial effects of music on development, how performers and audiences interact, and the social-emotional impact of music.
Consistent with recent efforts to involve the local community in the activities of McMaster, the goals of the Institute include partnering with musical groups and promoting musical activities and musical education in the community.
The first director of the Institute will be Laurel Trainor, a professor in the Department of Psychology, Neuroscience and Behaviour at McMaster. Trainor has published more than 60 pioneering research papers and book chapters on the neuroscience of auditory development and the perception of music. In addition, she holds a Bachelor of Music Performance from the University of Toronto, and has worked and taught as a professional flute player.
