Stephen Pollard

ByStephen Pollard, Stephen Pollard

Opinion

I'm back, and listening to Bach

September 18, 2009 09:59
1 min read

I'm sure you'll forgive me for my absence, helping my daughter adapt to the world!

This post on the Guardian's music blog on 'musical ear worms' fascinated me:

Ear-worms are dangerous things – those tunes that you carry around with
you in your subconscious, often a single song or melody that gets
unwittingly stuck in some ancient part of the brain; round and round it
goes on a loop you can't control, accompanying you daily commute and
your meetings at work, the first thing you hear in the morning and the
last thing you hear at night. Sometimes, it's a pleasurable experience,
as your prefrontal cortex dredges up a nostalgic pop song you forgotten
for years, a Chopin Mazurka you've been trying to play, or a Mozart aria you wish you could sing. 

I have them every day. At the moment it's a Bach aria we had on last night. (Incidentally, we listen to a lot of Bach and Sophie must have heard lots while Mrs P was pregnant. When we play it now, she stops whatever else she is doing and sits still, giving the impression, at least, of listening. I can't wait to see over the next few years how this develops.)