Primate Music (broadcast Friday, September 11th, 2009)
There's research on whales singing and birds dancing, but what about monkeys and apes? In this segment, we'll look at the musical abilities of our fellow primates. In one study, researchers gave electronic keyboards to bonobos and asked them to play along with musicians such as Peter Gabriel and Paul McCartney. In another study, published this month in in the journal Biology Letters, researchers examined whether humans could compose music tailored to produce an emotional response in cotton-top tamarin monkeys. We'll talk about what other members of the primate kingdom can teach humans about music.
Guests
Patricia Gray
Clinical Professor and Senior Research Scientist of BioMusic
Music Research Institute
University of North Carolina-Greensboro
Greensboro, North Carolina
David Teie
Cellist, National Symphony Orchestra
Washington D.C.
Related Links
- BioMusic
- Wild Music exhibition
- Science News: Play That Monkey Music
- NPR: Music Written For Monkeys Strikes A Chord
Segment produced by:Laura Pelcher
Listen:
Stories for
Friday, September 11th, 2009
Elsewhere on Sciencefriday.com
Frans de Waal and 'The Age of Empathy'
They Might Be Giants: Here Comes Science
Computing Consumer Preferences
Music and Cardiovascular Health
Tune Deafness and the Brain
A Grammy in Math
Oliver Sacks - Musicophilia
Macaque Research





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