I Heard There Was a Secret Chord: Music as Medicine

by Daniel J. Levitin

Science seeks to find truth in the natural world; art seeks to find truth in the emotional world.

A woman approached a musician after a concert (in some versions, it is Jascha Heifetz) and said, “Maestro, your violin sounds so wonderful.” He smiled at her and held the violin up to his ear and said, “I don’t hear a thing.” The lady was perplexed. The musician smiled again. “Madame, the violin doesn’t make the music. The music is being made by the man who is holding the violin.”

(As the comedian Martin Mull famously quipped, “writing about music is like dancing about architecture.”)

For instance, listening to relaxing, pleasant, self-chosen music significantly reduces pain and increases functional mobility in fibromyalgia patients, not just during, but after music listening.

While merely thinking that we can doesn’t guarantee success, thinking that we can’t guarantees failure.”

The legendary cellist Pablo Casals was asked, at age 90, why he continued to practice. “Because I think I’m making progress.”

There’s an old story about President Calvin Coolidge visiting an experimental government farm with his wife Grace. Guides showed them around different parts of the farm. When Mrs. Coolidge was taken to the chicken yard, she noticed that a rooster was mating very frequently. She asked the guide how often that happened, and the guide replied, “Dozens of times a day, Mrs. Coolidge.” Mrs. Coolidge said, “Go tell that to Mr. Coolidge.” A farmhand was sent to find the president and give him the message. On hearing it, the president asked, “Same hen every time?” “No, sir, a different hen every time.” The president said, “Tell that to Mrs. Coolidge.”

Some of the best music I’ve ever heard is music you’ve never heard.