Re: musical hallucinations (Thomas G Brennan )


Subject: Re: musical hallucinations
From:    Thomas G Brennan  <g_brennantg(at)TITAN.SFASU.EDU>
Date:    Thu, 8 Aug 2002 09:38:50 -0500

Over the past years that I've been a piano tuner I've discovered that while tuning a tempered scale I can sometimes bring musical selections to mind (in an auditory sense) by changing the speed of the beats of two notes I am tuning. Both the speed of the beats and the particular notes chosen seem to effect this. I seem to most often have this happen when tuning thirds and sixths but it does sometimes happen when tuning fourths and fifths. I suspect the lower frequency of halucinations (memories?) of these notes have to do with the slow rate of the beats used hence the minimal differences between them. My halucinations tend to be snatches of classical sounding music but I know of tuners who can trigger entire pieces this way. These are often pieces they have never heard. Tom Tom Brennan, CCC-A/SLP, RHD web page http://titan.sfasu.edu/~g_brennantg/sonicpage.html


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