By Rebecca Hyde

Rowan Public Library

How do humans respond to music? And why do they? How does the brain react to music, affecting memory, perception, knowledge, emotion and motion? And since we're health-conscious these days, we should probably want to know if music is good for us.

The following books discuss the human response to music and support the claim for music's beneficial effects on body, mind and soul.

"Music, the Brain, and Ecstasy: How Music Captures Our Imagination," by Robert Jourdain, describes the music/human relationship according to a hierarchy of complexity, from sound, tone, melody, harmony, rhythm, composition to performance.

This complexity is reflected in the "human receptor," through listening, understanding and ecstasy. We humans are introduced in the opening scene as music listeners and music lovers: In a dim, chilly, still cavern, animals gather; reverberating sounds are glorious and overpowering, producing ecstasy (defined as "sounds that leave you standing outside of yourself").

How long did it take for this very human response to music to develop? Or, in other words, how long did it take the mechanics of hearing to develop?

Hearing is the difficult sense and a late bloomer, compared to vision and touch and taste and smell: All in all, it took some 500 million years.

It's rather remarkable, both the evolutionary journey of hearing and the response of the ear, since the sensation of sound is built up by the mind.

"The Mozart Effect: Tapping the Power of Music to Heal the Body, Strengthen the Mind, and Unlock the Creative Spirit," by Don Campbell, goes further in championing the medicinal, or therapeutic, qualities of music.

"Health"comes from Old English "hal," a root word meaning "whole, hale, healing." "Heal," in Northern Middle English, signifies "to make sound," to become healthy again.

Campbell takes care to convince those people who believe they are not musically inclined: We have been prepared to listen while in the womb.

And not only can music heal, it can make us smarter, according to Campbell. In Chicago's inner-city Guggenheim School , accelerated language classes use the technique of active and passive concerts: Baroque for leisurely learning and dramatic, 19th-century for reinforcement, as the teacher's voice entrains with the music. The last chapter of the book is an A-to-Z accounting, from "Abrasions" to "Writer's Block," of music's healing powers.

"This is your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession," by Daniel J. Levitin, is an investigation of how humans experience music, of the interplay of mind and the brain.

Science meets art, or, as the author phrases it in his introduction, "I love music and I love science — Why would I want to mix the two?" Well, Levitin has mixed the two in his careers as rock musician and studio producer and now as head of the Laboratory for Musical Perception, Cognition, and Expertise at McGill University.

From the perspective of cognitive neuroscience, Levitin discusses research on music, musical meaning and musical pleasure.

If all of us hear music differently, how can we account for pieces that move so many people — Handel's "Messiah" or Don McLean's "Vincent (Starry Starry Night)"?

Or if we all hear music in the same way, how can we account for musical preference — Mozart or Madonna?

Music and the brain co-evolved. By better understanding music, we may better understand our motives, memories and how we communicate in a broad sense. In other words, we are hardwired for music.

Friends of the Library Book sale: Continues today, 1-4 p.m., and Monday, 10 a.m.-2 p.m., when books are $2 a bag.

Holiday closing: Headquarters, East and South branches will be closed in honor of Veterans Day, Monday, Nov. 12.

Children's services: Storytime — Headquarters: Baby Time, Wednesdays, 11 a.m.; Toddlers and Twos Time, Tuesdays at 10 and 11 a.m.; Preschool Time, Thursdays at 10:30 a.m.; Noodlehead Story Time, Thursdays at 4 p.m. East: Tuesdays and Wednesdays at 10:30 a.m. South: Toddlers and Twos, Wednesdays at 10:30 a.m.; Preschool, Mondays at 10:30 a.m.; Noodlehead, Mondays at 4 p.m.

November Tuesday movies: Headquarters library, every Tuesday night in November, 7 p.m., movies by Alfred Hitchcock.

Computer classes: Headquarters — Basic e-mail, Tuesday, 1:30 p.m.; Intro. Windows MovieMaker, Thursday, 9:15 a.m. South — eBay Buying, Thursday, 11 a.m.-12:30 p.m.; eBay Selling, Thursday, Nov. 15, 11 a.m.-12:30 p.m.

Displays: Headquarters — art by Norma Velasquez-Frink. East — World War II by Mike Smith. South — Rowan Doll Society.

Literacy: Call the Rowan County Literacy Council at 704-216-8266 for more information on teaching or receiving literacy tutoring for English speakers or for those for whom English is a second language.

Web site: www.rowanpubliclibrary.org.