Neural Oscillations can be thought of in terms of space or time, which means that they are periodic but they have the potential to evolve over time (pantha rei).

I take that to mean slight variations each time the period happens! "Upon those who step into the same rivers, different and ever different waters flow down" -- Heracleitus of Ephesus (540 B.C.)

Our brains are containers of electromagnetic activity: each neuron (out of billions in the brain) has a potential voltage of about -70 mV, compare that to a fresh AA battery at 1.5 V. It's a small amount of energy, but I believe it is mighty. The micro rhythms are constantly re-calibrating to information in and out of our systems.

Oscillations, Week 7, 4:3. The number of neurons we have isn't important, rather, it's the interconnectivity between neurons that has an impact on our thought patterns. We have about 100 billion neurons and 200 trillion connections between them. #Oscillations2021 #SoloInstruments #SoloSaxophone

Neurons emit electrical signals to one another, and their synchronous firing creates brain waves, which we measure in cycles per second (Hz). We generally refer to 5 categories of brain waves: Delta (0.5-4 Hz), Theta (4-8 Hz), Alpha (8-12 Hz), Beta (12-30 Hz), and Gamma (> 30 Hz); these boundaries were drawn kind of arbitrarily following the discoveries of Hans Berger; and there are many more categories faster and slower than these.

Human brains weigh, on average, about 3 lbs, 2.2 ounces, but there are all different kinds of sizes. Within that space, white matter comprises at least 40% of that weight. White matter includes the fibers that connect neurons (axons, myelin). Gray matter, on the other hand, includes the neurons themselves (cell bodies, dendrites, synapses, capillaries, gilal cells). White matter is where we find energy for both excitatory action potentials and their inhibitory counterparts. #Oscillations2021 #SoloInstruments #SoloSaxophone

In addition to the neurons that excite, the brain has neurons that inhibit. This inhibitory system balances things out, and runs in a more nonlinear way (in other words, harder to predict) than excitatory neurons. Let’s say there are 3 neurons in a row (A B C), and inhibitory neuron A is activated. A will suppress the activity of B, which means that neuron B won’t inhibit neuron C as much, so then neuron C will excite the next neuron more, and so on. There are different kinds of inhibition – feedback, feed-forward, lateral inhibition – that we could totally unpack over these weeks. At this point, what questions do you have about neuron activity in the brain? #Oscillations2021 #SoloInstruments #SoloSaxophone

You may be wondering how neuroscientists measure these patterns of rhythm (and more) in the brain. Our technological advancements are constantly growing, but it’s surprising that we aren’t able to see areas at the scale of neuron activity in the human brain. There are some really cool videos of living mice neurons firing captured by photon fluorescence microscopy and optical laser scanning, but this procedure is too invasive for healthy human brains. The other methods are EEG (electroencephalography), MEG (magnetoencephalography) – which both analyze action and field potentials; fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) – detects changes in energy production; single-cell recording techniques – picks up on voltages by a tiny pin inserted close to the neuron; triangulation by tetrodes – uses 4 electrodes and isn’t great for single-cell isolation. With our powers combined, we STILL don’t have the best measurement for these single neurons in humans.

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The good news is that the interactions of many neurons together create signals that have been studied for a while now. For example, mutual entrainment happens when many single-cell oscillators with different rhythms are connected, and we see a global rhythm. Single neurons will fire (phase-locked) to the global rhythm. If one gets faster, the others coerce it to slow down. Amplitudes and phases lock in to form a synchronous unit, which is so much like playing music with people, it blows my mind. #Oscillations2021 #SoloInstruments #SoloSaxophone

There are a lot of folks who write and talk about the relationships between pitch, rhythm, and harmony in our musical world, even though we work so hard to separate them. Some would even go so far to say that they are all pretty much the same thing. For me, some influential thoughts and practices stem from composer / pianist Henry Cowell’s New Musical Resources, composer William Allaudin Mathieu’s Harmonic Experience, and musician / composer Wendy Carlos. The perspective is that sound is energy, vibration, and frequency, which can all be experienced in realm of feeling pulse, or periodic events in time.

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For example, an impulse that occurs 120 times per minute, or every 500 milliseconds, is also the frequency of 2Hz, or two cycles per second, so the current of energy is changing direction twice per second. We’ll hear a pulse in this case. But, if we travel into the land of 30Hz and above, we’ll hear pitch – same stimulus, different experience. Of course all of this depends on our hearing systems, the ear, cochlea, auditory nerve, and brainstem. When we compare these numbers to our experience, there’s a zone around 20Hz that sounds like roughness, the delta band (0.5-4Hz) sounds like musical pulse, the theta band (4-8Hz) corresponds with musical pulse, alpha (8-12Hz) and beta bands (12-30Hz) vary from person to person, and the gamma band (> 30 Hz) sounds like low pitch.

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When we relate this to the harmonic overtone series, we can determine the ratios between intervals, which end up looking a lot like the oscillations I’ve been working on: perfect unison (1:1), minor 2nd (14:15), major 2nd (8:9), minor 3rd (5:6), major 3rd (4:5), perfect 4th (3:4), tritone (5:7), perfect 5th (2:3), minor 6th (5:8), major 6th (3:5), minor 7th (4:7), major 7th (8:15), and perfect octave (1:2). #Oscillations2021 #SoloInstruments #SoloSaxophone

The idea of ratios between pitch intervals is a contentious topic in the academy, as there are many alternative tuning systems that could give rise to hearing audible beats. If the intervals are played by computer-generated sine (pure/simple) tones in isolation, and even by one instrument (in the case of a multiphonic) or two instruments, we’ll most likely hear them more clearly. Our ears will perceive these rubs at a rate that equals the difference between the two frequencies played. If the difference frequency is larger than 15Hz, those rubs get more intense, and we hear roughness. And if the differences keep getting bigger, we’ll start to hear two separate tones. All of this relates to the anatomy of the inner ear: if two tones are activating the basilar membrane (the hard membrane inside the snail-like cochlea), most likely we’ll hear roughness, and the roughness disappears when the frequency separation is equal to the critical bandwidth (this varies, but can hover around 100Hz for humans, for tones below 500Hz). There are an estimated 24 critical bands, each about 1/3 of an octave, in our audible system. Separately, difference tones - some name them combination, subjective, or Tartini tones - occur when two tones are sounded together and a buzzing, lower frequency is heard. This exposes nonlinearities in our auditory system. For example, two tones at 1k and 1.5kHz will produce a difference tone of 500Hz, but the combination of those tones, 2.5kHz, is rarely heard, even though it’s within audible range. #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Taking a closer look at the dot visuals in these videos will reveal that these rhythms look symmetric. This week, I’m also coupling this with a symmetric pattern of pitches, never playing its midpoint, F#, until the end. Years ago, Tony Malaby taught me a similar pitch exercise and explained how he thought of it like a blooming flower. Unlike these symmetries in music, oscillations in the brain are rarely (dareIsaynever) symmetric. We think the brain rhythms look symmetric, linear, as in a Gaussian distribution, but they aren’t. Rather, the peaks versus valleys of oscillatory activity fluctuate over time. This relates to the common finding that certain frequency band oscillations are nonlinear. There’s a great paper from 2008 by Mazaheri & Jensen showing that when people look at visual stimuli and alpha band frequency (8-12Hz) is generated, the peaks are more strongly modulated than the valleys, resulting in slower components in rhythmic responses. They say this is in part due to “inward dendritic currents,” those tree branches involved in directing energy both inward to and outward from the cell bodies. How fun to see that there are simultaneous irregular and complex rhythms happening in our brains! #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

As you now know, there are many different oscillators operating simultaneously in our brains and bodies, ranging from slower than 0.5Hz to upwards of 600Hz, or 30 to 36,000 bpm! And as a reminder, the brain’s main goal is to control movement, it’s the only way it can connect to the outside world. There are other cycles that are important to our daily lives. Circadian rhythms are some of the slowest oscillators with a pace of about 24 hours and 11 minutes, but some research shows we may prefer a 25-hour cycle. These rhythms are communicated to the body via the suprachiasmatic nuclei, receiving input from various regions, including the brainstem, retina, limbic structures, and other hypothalamic nuclei. Diurnal rhythms are like circadian, but act in sync with the day and night. Ultradian rhythms are shorter than circadian rhythms and can include blood circulation, hormone secretion, heart rate, endocrine rhythms, arousal, and respiration. In contrast, infradian rhythms are longer than circadian and have been illustrated in menstrual cycles, hibernation, molting, and reproduction behavior. All of these rhythms are synchronized by internal timing mechanisms in the brain. #Oscillations2021

Neural oscillators are often categorized into bands of frequencies (delta, theta, alpha, beta, low and high gamma), and some data on monaural and binaural beats indicates that listening to certain frequencies has the potential to improve mood states. Monaural beat stimulation is when a composite frequency is played to one or both ears simultaneously, so you actually hear a physical beat when listening. Binaural beat stimulation is more subjective and subtle. Each ear is separately presented with a different frequency, and neuroscientists have shown that this combinatory effect is processed in the medial superior olivary nuclei (in the brainstem), so you can’t physically detect a beat, but parts of your brain do.

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Research has shown effects with repetitive binaural beat stimulation in the delta (0.5-4Hz) and theta (4-8Hz) frequency ranges for anxiety, tension, confusion, and fatigue, and in the beta range (12-30Hz) for depression and negative mood states. The insight or ureka moment has been associated with a spike in gamma rhythm, and increased reports of creative thought are likewise coupled with neural oscillations from 10-40Hz. There are many studies on the topic, and results seem to vary from person to person. I think this is all useful information, especially if you’re open to self-experimentation. #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Our auditory systems are non-linear, so we need fun ways to look at how the internal dynamics of the brain could or could not be related to the sound itself. For example, oscillators in the brain are capable of locking in with what the music is doing, but they are also capable of providing something that the music is not doing, but maybe implying. There are multiple mechanisms at play: the sensory network, the motor network, and the sound itself…Most of the time, we see the rhythms in the brain responding to frequencies in the music. We have seen studies that show almost identical responses to the music (Nina Kraus) in the brain, and others where oscillatory interactions give rise to an absent pulse, even when we’re listening to complex rhythms like this one (Ed Large). One common word that researchers love to use when writing about this stuff is entrainment, which means that one system synchronizes with another system, in a rhythmic way. We’re literally boarding that train. #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Researchers once believed that neurons keep dying over our lives, but through her extensive research on monkey brains, Elizabeth Gould found newly birthed neurons in mature adult monkeys. Y’all, the idea of birthing of new neurons, or neurogenesis, is controversial. Holocaust survivor Joseph Altman was one of the first to discover neurogenesis in adults in the 60s. It’s important to note that Altman’s work was ridiculed in the science community, and now his papers are available for free, outside of the many restricted paywalls we encounter when looking up these kinds of studies.

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In the 80s Pasko Rakic wrote a paper and stated that all neurons in the brains of rhesus monkeys are created in pre- and briefly post-natal life; in other words, we get this set of neurons, and we can’t make anymore over our lives. Turns out that’s not true, but the thing is that many neuroscientists kept endorsing Rakic’s results over the years. So here comes hero Elizabeth Gould – in the late 80s and 90s, she found new neurons in marmoset monkeys, in the olfactory cortex (taste, smell) and hippocampus (limbic system, memory formations). The neurogenesis results were published in ‘98. Elizabeth also found that social stress and lab environments inhibit neuron growth, and now we know that reduced sleep and depression have negative effects on new neuron growth. Related to the work she was doing before (namely how stress hormones affect neuron death in rats) Gould is now unpacking how hormones play a role in neurogenesis -- I’m over here waiting patiently. Oh, and Rakic finally admitted neurogenesis was real in 1999. How do you think this research is useful for musicians? Drop in some comments and let’s talk! #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Even though multi-tasking seems tough (high-level executive function in prefrontal cortex), it still depends on feedback from sensory areas of the brain, including the thalamus. I have a sneaking suspicion that this is also the case for so many other “intellectual” things we do, but I’m still learning a lot about attention switching. Looking at mice brains during tasks that involve both visual and auditory cues, neuroscientists witnessed single neurons responding selectively to visual or auditory worlds, and groups of neurons collectively “talking” to their respective working memories to decide what they’re going to pay attention to. And these networks of communication seem to involve groups of neurons firing and passing information from one set to the next in both the prefrontal cortex (higher-level cognitive) and the thalamus (sensory). This is a recent study I read about from Michael Halassa’s lab at MIT, and Michael is also a psychiatrist. Their results make me feel excited because they show me that that our learning and memory are deeply connected to sensory mechanisms in the body. It seems that Halassa’s work aims to redefine the thalamus as a non-sensory switchboard for cognitive information, but I’m stuck on its relationship to our senses. If feeling/sensitivity/responsiveness and reasoning/intellect/brain power depend on each other like this, why are we always trying to separate them when we talk about music and other art forms? Let me know what you think in the comments below, or write me a DM. #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Overall, it seems that the brain is dynamically changing its connectivity to deal with certain functions in life. Within this kind of a model, there can be short-lived oscillations, or rhythmic activities, that are perpetually created and then destroyed. In some cases, we’re continually moving between complex and predictable synchrony. I’ve been thinking about this idea but in a different way, not in terms of creation and destruction, but instead as transferring energy. The rhythmic activity can’t simply disappear, it feels like it does, but it’s merely shape-shifting into something else that wasn’t what we recognized before. And now our energy / activity / electricity has moved to a different micro-location in the brain or the body. We’re at a halfway point in the series, and my energy has certainly been transported to many places that I know but others (perhaps at the micro-level) that I’m not aware of. How do you personally track energy movement, and do you consciously feel it shift in your daily lives? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Most of the rhythms in our biological, brain, and nervous systems are affected by the presence of proteins. Neuroscientist Carla Green found nocturnin (Noc), which is a protein encoded by the Nocturnin gene – I’m interested in this because this gene expresses itself during the dark, late night hours. Nocturnin’s rhythmic activity doesn’t just occur in the brain, but also in the liver and other organs. Green’s lab found that alcohol negatively impacts circadian clock processes in the liver, which we could guess, as many report having trouble sleeping after a night of intense drinking. Carla Green has also been at the forefront of discovering cryptoproteins, or blue light receptor proteins in plants and mammals. Cryptoproteins proteins have the potential to inhibit rhythms in our circadian clocks and change their overall period lengths. There are other substances in the nervous system that directly degrade the power of these cryptochrome proteins to protect the oscillation of circadian clocks. All for the love of rhythm! #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Do you ever feel stuck? Oscillatory rhythms in our brains and nervous systems are affected by traumatic – physical or psychological – events. These traumatic events could make us act and feel like we’re in a repetitive loop, in other words, feeling stuck. And, they tend to mess with regular oscillatory rhythms and thus interrupting the way rhythms synchronize our thoughts and actions. As an example, alpha rhythms (between 8 and 12 Hz) usually increase when we aren’t doing or thinking about anything; they’re called idling rhythms. Other neuroscientists show strong alpha rhythms during activities that need prolonged attention. Seems complicated, right? What isn’t, though? What’s also interesting (and maybe debatable) is that for psychiatric complications like PTSD and OCD, alpha rhythms abnormally decrease during resting states and also during tasks that see an alpha increase for people without these conditions. The jury is still out on what causes this - we can’t confidently say that PTSD and OCD cause decreases in alpha rhythm. But, what might be useful to think about is how “re-training” these rhythms could help with positive-outcome therapies - finding a way to encourage the alpha rhythms to help our mental wellbeing. What do you do to get unstuck? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Trying new things…when we learn new habits, brain rhythms switch from one frequency bucket to another. In other words, the overall pulse neurons are firing at changes when we are motivated to learn new ways of living. There’s a part of the brain called the basil ganglia, and it is involved, among with many other things, with forming habits. Looking at rat brains, neuroscientists at MIT found that before finishing a maze, brain rhythms in this region hovered around the high gamma range (between 70-90 Hz, or cycles per second). But when rats figured out how to solve the maze, data showed more activity in the beta range (15-28 Hz, or cycles per second). A slower set of rhythms. When the researchers zoomed in to individual neurons, they saw that when we’re in the process of forming a habit, specific neurons in the basil ganglia recruit other parts of the brain to help out. Once the habit becomes automatic, those recruiters are inhibited by other neurons telling them, “we’re all good, you can focus on something else now”. We see this change as a rhythmic response, which is fascinating to me. What are some new things you’re working on in your life? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Making more of an effort to connect this work to a healing practice, so here goes! Recently I’ve been re-watching the older seasons of Twin Peaks - Angelo Badalamenti’s music inspired this miniature. Remember that episode where Hawk explains the black lodge to Cooper? They’re talking about the idea of a shadow self - it’s a nod to the work of Carl Jung. Although I’m sure David Lynch was interested in these concepts, I think this was more of a Mark Frost idea. Anyway, the point here is that we all have what’s called a “shadow self”. Jung believed that the ego expressed itself in ethical values, which “confuses itself with the façade personality”. This part of our selves is what we show others and allows us to feel that we’re a part of something. The other part – the shadow self – is what we hide from others and repress into our subconscious. The shadow self reveals itself in the midst of addictive behaviors and most people “turn a blind eye to the shadow-side of human nature”. But what if, instead, we listened to those shadow selves and what they needed in order to soften and make room for transformation? I think, in essence, we could also consider the rhythms in our various systems (e.g. neurological, nervous) to access the power of our shadow selves, however dark they may be. What do you think about these connections to the work of oscillations? Drop a comment here or DM me! #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Short and sweet today. I read an older article from 2010 this weekend looking into how active a meditation practice truly is and how it affects neurological rhythms. A lot of people, myself included, think of meditation as a passive state, sitting and letting the sounds of the environment wash over you while breathing lightly. These researchers in Bonn, Germany found that meditative states give rise to higher frequency (faster) gamma rhythms in the brain, especially for Buddhist practitioners with over 20 years of meditation experience. The same study found that gamma activity is also common for neural plasticity and circuits of regenerative processing – creating new thoughts / learning new things. I’m ruminating on this work and will continue my reflections into next week, but in the meantime, what are your reactions? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

How meditation affects brain rhythms is a complex story, but are you surprised? Life is full of complexities that can be understood by breaking them into smaller, more manageable parts. There are so many varieties of meditation; mantra, walking, transcendental, open-monitoring, mindfulness, loving-kindness, and focused attention to name a few. It turns out that theta activity (sleep / dream / slower) increases in the front of the brain and gamma activity (learning / memory / faster) increases in the back of the brain during focused attention and open monitoring meditation. So these rhythms are occurring simultaneously – a wild internal state during a calming practice!

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There’s also a finding from a lab in Argentina showing that if you meditate over a long periods of time, what they see is an increase in entropy of oscillations during the meditative state. In other words, long-term meditation leads to more disordered and random oscillatory patterns in the brain. The Vipassana tradition showed the largest effect when compared to focused attention, open monitoring, and open awareness meditations; and, specifically for alpha (focused / relaxed) and gamma bands. Effectively, long-term meditation puts us into states of high entropy, high uncertainty, and high unpredictability. It’s not what I would expect, but at the same time, it makes so much sense. What are your thoughts on creating an internal state of high entropy? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

When we recall memories about our lives, oscillations in the theta band (4-8 Hz) are commonly observed. But! And there’s always a but…there’s a history of controversy with respect to theta oscillations. Some neuroscientists have noted that it’s a state of willingness that we’re observing – the choice to recall a memory or event. Nevertheless, I read an MEG study where people recorded themselves 1) talking about a significant event in their lives and 2) reading aloud from a book about neighborhoods in Toronto, Canada. Data showed theta synchrony in the medial temporal lobe (hippocampus, amygdala, parahippocampal areas) with the precuneus and medial prefrontal cortex. All this jargon seems to suggest that there’s a network for remembering significant and personal memories, since theta oscillations occur at the same time in multiple places. It seems that we see these bursts of similar rhythmic activity – kind of like fireflies that are in sync in different places around us. Of course, there’s a lot to unpack, and this is my quick simplification of what’s going on, but…it says so much about how a thought, triggered by the sound of us talking about it, can release rhythms in our brains that are synchronous in different areas. What are your thoughts about theta oscillations and their connection to autobiographical memories? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Full disclosure - this miniature is a complete copy of the pitches in the left hand of Prelude 24 from Bach’s Well Tempered Clavier (Book II). When I work on transcriptions like this, where I’m literally reinterpreting or copying someone else’s music, to me, it’s a way of recreating what they heard, their memories, their experiences – with a deep amount of respect. I am curious about how our brain rhythms change when we recall real (as mentioned last week) versus false memories. There’s a lot of research out there on how we create (encode) and recall (retrieve) memories, and one finding is that the pattern of oscillations in the brain that is present when we create the memory is also present when we retrieve it! It sounds simple, but isn’t that miraculous? In essence, when we remember something correctly, a specific set of rhythms occurs that matches the rhythms that were occurring inside our brains when the event happened.

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Also, it turns out that high gamma band oscillations (44-100Hz, and again, this translates to 2,640-6,000 beats per minute) in the hippocampus, prefrontal cortex, and temporal lobe occur during encoding and retrieval of true memories, compared with other frequency bands. Some say that gamma oscillations are just associated with more attention and arousal, but others say that there is an “item-specific” memory process going on here. Personally I’m more excited by the item-specific process. How do you think this relates to the way we remember our own versus other people’s music? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Depending on the kind of music, it could be common to practice patterns. In the beginning, it may be fingering patterns, scales, hand and body positions, and over time it could expand to other realms of sound - interval patterns (like the one in this video), gestures, rhythmic patterns, alternate fingerings, emulating the environment with the instrument. In the world of oscillations, there are also patterns that neuroscientists have observed with respect to timing/rhythm, their location in the brain, and what other areas are showing activity at the same time. For example, when we are in our earlier stage of sleep, there’s a specific pattern occurring between 7-14 Hz called spindle oscillations. Some people call them sigma waves – you thought we were done with the Greek alphabet, right? Alas… These oscillations are generally associated with a structure called the thalamus, but of course there are connections within different areas of the thalamus (like front/back, upper/lower sides – anatomy folk use terms like rostral, caudal, dorsal, ventral, etc) and distant areas of the neocortex. So, this pattern of bursts (7-12Hz) are happening for 0.5-2 seconds every 3-6 seconds. It’s likely that these spindles help to solidify certain memories – some research shows motor memories are improved more than declarative/fact-based memories. Sounds powerfully fast and effective, doesn’t it? I’ve seen graphs, but I’d love to see if it’s possible to “hear,” or maybe simply feel, these spindle oscillations in the sound realm. #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

This one is dedicated to Mario Pavone, who I’ve been thinking a lot about since I went to his memorial last weekend. I miss him. He was so encouraging and full of energy. in April we were texting and he sent me some words about my 5:7 Oscillation: “very cool…in the style of Braxton/Pavone/Davis.” What a true inspiration and friend he was. Since his life, spirit, and music held so much weight, the neurophysiological state in his brain must carry on, right? My dad died of complications related to arrhythmia, so naturally I’ve been looking into what happens to the brain during heart-related electrical problems. I read this study from a lab in Ann Arbor where they measured brain wave activity before, during, and after “experimental” cardiac arrest. I know, sounds brutal. I definitely wouldn’t want to be the lab assistant pressing those buttons. In short, they observed synchronous high-frequency (gamma) bursts of activity during cardiac arrest, on a global scale. What’s even more striking to me is that high-frequency activity in near-death experiences exceeded levels during conscious states. Not just that, but there’s coupling with theta and alpha waves elsewhere in the brain and coherence between certain regions. It seems to suggest that our brains are highly conscious, lucid, vivid, hype (!) when we die. What is there to be afraid of if we’re that centered? It’s certainly something to think about. Let me know your thoughts in the comments / DM and thanks for listening. #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Practicing pitch collections and accents this week. Made me realize how skeptical I am about these words: consonance and dissonance. I get why they exist as a way to communicate with people, but as I continue listening throughout my life, I find them completely intertwined and indistinguishable. Isn’t it great that these words are peppered throughout the Music Cognition literature, in studies far and wide…I read an article this weekend that compared macaque monkey and human brain responses to “consonant” and “dissonant” musical chords. There’s an interesting footnote on the first page – “the costs of publication of this article were defrayed in part by the payment of page charges. The article must therefore be hereby marked “advertisement…” – SMDH. Examples of “dissonant chords” are minor and major seconds and “consonant chords” are octaves and perfect fifths. I wish you could see my face right now. Anyway what IS cool about this study is that they looked to see if oscillatory patterns in the auditory cortex (the sensory area for processing sound in the brain) displayed phase locked activity, matching oscillatory patterns in the sound/chord itself. And what they found is that when chords are “dissonant,” certain areas like Heschl’s gyrus respond by oscillating at the difference frequencies in the input sound. So the sensory areas are doing the math, phase-locking, and responding in these very predictable ways. For “consonant chords,” there aren’t as many phase-locked oscillatory patterns. I’ve also read in another study that phase-locked oscillations indicate better memory for learning new things, so does that mean we’ll remember those “dissonant chords” the next time around? I would hope so, cause they are too stimulating not to remember. Do you think these words are helpful to understanding music? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

This week’s miniature came out of me improvising with a Western adaptation of Balinese pelog tonality, usually played in Gamelan ensembles within a particular tuning system. This week I listened to a lot of music from Bali, and that led me to think about empathy for pain, given all the acts of hatred directed towards people of Asian descent this year. Researchers in a lab in the Republic of China showed people photos of hands in both neutral + painful situations, asking them how painful it looked and how unpleasant they felt while looking at the picture. Sounds fun, right? Lol. Anyway, they found non-phase locked neural responses in response to perceived pain, which means the characteristics of the waveforms are different, but they occur at similar moments in time (time-locked). 200 ms after seeing the photo! Pretty quick. For hands doing painful things, they saw more theta oscillations (3-8Hz), but those decreased over time, due to what they call “cognitive appraisal,” or evaluating how the pain feels. During the time we are processing others’ and our own pain, alpha band oscillations (8-12Hz) are also decreasing, suggesting that over time, we’re regulating emotions and response to pain. Do you think this regulation is a good thing? I’m split on it. I can see how regulation could be helpful to our mental stability, but if we’re evaluating others’ pain, wouldn’t it suggest we’re less likely to help them? Would love to hear your thoughts on this. Keep on listening to music from different parts of the world, everyone, and take care of each other. #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Failure is an important part of the learning process. Remember when I told you this is a practice log? Here's a video of me failing to feel this pattern correctly in 9, 7, and then 5. This really takes time, and you'll notice that I feel more comfortable with the faster beats than the smaller ones.

Turns out our brain oscillations can also show when we've made a mistake. One study found that when people failed a task, there was an influx of gamma power (30-60Hz) in the parietal cortex 100ms before the task! Are these faster oscillations the reason we make mistakes, or do we know we're about to make a mistake and so these oscillations come through? They also found that alpha oscillations (5-12Hz) were more likely to be phase locked when people didn't make mistakes. Phase locked oscillations helps us perform better. I have all kinds of questions about this, but what questions do you have? Would you share an example of a practice session failure? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

ABA’B’ – BAB’A’ – A’B’AB – B’A’BA. I was practicing structural form last week, a lot, so here’s a short example of a measure inspired by a phrase in the Modus Novus book. What can I say, sometimes Swedish people inspire me ;) I’ve been thinking a lot about how we decode and process language, as my study of Swedish and musical form have been overlapping. I read a cool paper from 10 years ago in which the authors developed a model for what happens in the brain when we are hearing someone speaking to us. They hypothesize that cortical oscillations provide a means for organizing those spoken sounds, in two ways – 1) phase-locking between the speech (out there) and brain (in here) and 2) hierarchical coupling of cortical oscillations (in here). The phase locking component shows that these rhythms are constantly adjusting in dynamic and empathetic ways to try to mirror the speech signal. The coupling part means that one of kind of oscillation influences / modulates the activity of another oscillation, like theta-gamma coupling in language processing. Because of these mechanisms, if we’re hearing really muffled speech that maintains its syllabic rhythm, we can still comprehend it. Syllabic form, in a rhythmic sense, is strong and impressionable! What do you think about this model, and how does it relate to your life? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

This week I've been practicing the idea of "catching up," using the same pitches (1 octave apart) in the upper and lower voices, so the result sounds like one of those little baby chicks running behind the mama. When we're trying to figure out how something makes us feel (sensory wise/like cold, hot, hungry, etc), our brains may actually inhibit other streams, like visual ones, to direct more resources to those sensory systems, so they can catch up to what's going on. More on this next week, as I have to go catch up on some sleep, lol. What are you catching up on this week? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

This week I was working on a set of pitches from three triads, designing 7 bars that morph from the symmetric midpoint outward. The image I have in my mind is of one of those Popples that morph into a cute fluffy friend from a big fluffball. When I was little, I went everywhere with my pink Party Popple. I’ve been looking into how brain rhythms/oscillations are affected by cognitive challenges, namely, bipolar disorder. It seems important for neuroscientists to look into all the different frequency ranges as biomarkers; and in one paper, the authors found that stable mood (euthymic) bipolar patients had highly reduced alpha activity, and moderately reduced theta and gamma coherence during certain tasks. To me, the important piece of this puzzle is that these finding aren’t locked, we see changes over time; they morph into different patterns, as humans are wont to do. What mutations do you find in your life? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

I have been exploring contrary motion in my improvising lately – here’s a quick example I came up with during this process. It feels like our brains, as hyper-organizers and planners, can move in contrary motion from our thoughts, and sometimes it’s nice to explore that through a wandering mind, a daydream, a journal with scribbled imaginations, a walk down an unknown path, or a musical phrase that has no start or finish. In some cases these contrary motions can be debilitating, as with epileptic patients. In college I had a friend with epilepsy who tragically passed away due to complications related to a seizure, but he had been talking with a specialist who considered removing one of the affected areas. We had long, memorable conversations about how this might’ve affected his life, but he wasn’t able to see that moment through. I think of him and his noble spirit often.

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Another invasive epileptic exploration involves implanting electrodes on various areas of the brain’s surface, which is a helpful way neuroscientists can record brain rhythms more accurately than a standard EEG. For example, a group of researchers at Stanford took a deep look into the retrosplenial cortex, folded inside of the corpus callosum, in epileptic brains. Recording activity in this region is made possible by these electrode implants. When those patients recalled memories about their lives, the authors saw a theta band interaction (3-4Hz) between the retrosplenial cortex and the medial temporal lobe that was unique. The retrosplenial cortex is also known to be suppressed during moments of focused attention and active working memory. I’m wondering now if autobiographical memory and memory for doing things are inherently contrary? I’d love to hear your thoughts about this, write me a message if you have a moment! #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Trying out some lower numbers with 11 this week, focusing on 4ths and 5ths, with a secret code revealed at the end. If you can find it, post in the comments! I haven’t had a lot of time to read this week with all the international travel, but here’s something small I learned this morning at the Paris Charles de Gaulle aeroport. Been looking into how synchronization of oscillations across brain regions relates to abnormalities in motor function. A study of Parkinson’s patients showed that resonating frequencies between 60-80 Hz encourage normal movements. What’s more exciting is that stimulating certain areas (with this frequency range) in the subthalamic nucleus (STN) and globus pallidus internus (GPi) can help improve voluntary movement – this kind of stimulation, and synchronization, can help patients direct more attention to those neural networks to eventually carry out the movement. I find a lot of hope for studies like these; they show that our book of healing methods for movement is ever-expanding. What are some alternative healing methods, related to movement, that you’ve found for your own lives? Yoga, stretching, frequency stimulation, dance? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Tone row explorations (0 1 4 6 7 10 12 2 3 5 8 9, same one as last week), the first two bars have two major triads – D and Ab major – and make up the first 6 notes of the row, while the second two bars have two minor triads – E and Bb minor – and make up the second 6 notes of the row. It’s fun to imagine how different organizations of notes in a row could mirror what’s going on with neurons in the brain. Over the week I was reading about Donald O. Hebb’s cell assembly hypothesis. To keep it short and sweet, he saw that groups of cells assemble and connect because they excite each other, and so their synapses (the parts that send electric and chemical signals) are strengthened by the fact that they activate in synchrony. In his book from 1949, Hebb wrote, “when an axon of cell A is near enough to excite cell B and repeatedly or persistently takes part in firing it, some growth process or metabolic change takes place in one or both cells such that A’s efficiency, as one of cells firing B, is increased.” You may have heard the phrase, “cells that fire together, wire together”. When people say this, they’re really referencing Donald Hebb. Another cool concept he had was that this activity can result in loops of neuron chains (like bars!), and it can go on and on past the input, in a nonlinear way. Engineers call this “hysteresis,” it’s like a lagging response. Cell assemblies, lagging responses, and synchronicity, all ideas have existed since the late 40s. What are the older ways you see pitches assembled, do they synchronize in certain ways for you, and how do these assemblies and synchronicities inform your own practice? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Sometimes going back to the basics – playing major scales, feeling different partials of the triplet – is just what the doctor ordered. Over the weekend I read a study conducted in Paris where they measured brain wave activity of 13 premature babies, 3-7 days after birth, looking at the effect of movement and hand/foot stimulation. The authors found delta-brushes (8-25Hz), considered “rapid oscillations” in areas corresponding to that particular part of the body. Basically, we have these somatotopic maps that relate directly to what’s happening in certain parts of our bodies - I included a photo of this so you can see. How incredible that our brains have already developed these sensory maps before we can feel our place around the world! Their findings support the idea that movements in the womb help to create the sense of space and stimulation, designing our cortical body maps. For me, practicing is a daily return to these basic sensory experiences of time, space, melody, rhythm, texture, form, etc: reminding myself to attend and nurture them in my playing. What are some of the “back to basic” ideas you practice daily? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

And sometimes you find yourself practicing melodies that simply make you feel good, as the weather changes and all the things are happening. Continuing to have empathy for all those folks on highs, on lows, and everything in between. Holding the inequities close to my heart, making space for them. Always happy to spend time in this space, and if you need anything, don’t hesitate to DM.

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Quick share here: currently still trying to understand a paper about emotions conducted in a Catholic University in Milan. They wanted to find out how individual differences in emotional processing could potentially regulate brain oscillations. So far I’ve learned that they found delta and theta oscillations involved with how much something arouses us, and alpha rhythms involved with how we judge how “good” or “bad” something is. It’s cool that these patterns change with how motivated we are in the emotional realm of life. Do you feel that your emotions interact with how motivated you are? How so? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Working on a one-measure idea last week was enough, considering the onslaught of emotions present in our small music community. I decided to focus on rhythmic loops here, all within the context of feeling 10 as the dominant pulse. The brain is full of loops, with respect to how one part connects/communicates with another. Most loops have inhibitory and excitatory components, so it’s not always energy moving, it could be energy not moving. Neuroscientists have found there are multiple loops from the neocortex (higher cognitive functioning) to the basal ganglia (top of midbrain). Those loops include: neocortex-striatum-pallidum, neocortex-striatum-substantia nigra pars reticulata, neocortex-subthalamic nucleus-pallidum, and neocortex-subthalamic nucleus-substantia nigra pars reticulate. That’s a mouthful.

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Let’s think about an example: neurons in the pallidum are often inhibiting the thalamus so we don’t move in weird ways, but when we DO want to move, the putamen inhibits the pallidum so the thalamus can then receive the “let’s move” signal. The subthalamic nucleus can also inhibit activity to the thalamus in a different, parallel running loop. So much rhythm, in the form of signals, is occurring when we put one foot in front of the other. What are the loops, musical or otherwise, that run your daily lives? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Resting can be a challenge on so many fronts – musically, physically, mentally – and we need a healthy amount of it to function at a base level. We all have differing ideas of what rest means: a vacation? simply sitting and breathing? taking a walk? watching a movie? having a drink with a friend? In any case, on some level it’s clear that rest changes our response to activity in meaningful and impactful ways. For example, listening to the same 2-measure phrase with rests in different places helps me hear it in a unique way each time. How do your systems process musical phrases with thoughtful rests?

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Neuroscientists have continuously shown that the brain is never truly resting. While we’re “resting” on the outside, what it’s doing internally is fluctuating between patterns that occur in certain places at distinct times (oscillations!!). One very important paper from 2007 uncovered six different resting state networks across the brain. Using both techniques of fMRI and EEG, they found more than one rhythm happening within each of those networks, which means that neurons oscillate in these different frequency bands (e.g. delta, theta, gamma, etc) at the same time. It also implies that all those simultaneous activities, dynamically playing with one another, relate to the same function our brains are dealing with at that moment. Networks, interplay, dynamics, resting – sounds a lot like music to me. What do you think? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Broke my condition of not using headphones this week to hear the 10th and 11th partials of the overtone series. I have recently played with a couple composers (Kengchakaj Kengkarnka and Anna Webber) who are exploring different tuning systems in their writing. In just intonation, the 10th and 11th partials are 14 and 49 cents flat, respectively. I wanted to see how they would sound in their natural state, with an oscillating rhythm that matches the 10:11 ratio.

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The inspiration came out of a paper that Ed Large shared with me. The authors (Razdan & Patel, 2016) played rhythmic equivalents of 12 familiar intervals/chords for listeners and asked them to rate pleasantness, complexity, groove, and beat induction (basically how strongly they feel an underlying pulse from the rhythm). They then compared those ratings to previous ratings for pitch ratios. So, a perfect fifth ratio is 3:2, and it’s rhythmic equivalent would sound like: pass the sugar, emphasis on “pass” and “shu”. They found that most of the ratings for rhythms looked similar to their pitch equivalents. For example, high pleasantness for the major 6th, perfect 4th, perfect 5th, and major triad, and low for tritones, major 7th, minor 2nd, major 2nd, and diminished triad. The ones that really get me are the triads: major is 6:5:4, minor is 15:12:10, augmented is 25:20:16, and diminished is 64:54:45, lol. The participants in this study were students at Tufts, with at least 5 years of musical training, but these ratings might look different for others, who really love those particular intervals/chords and complex cross-rhythms! Their explanation refers to how non-linear oscillatory models of neural activity help us to understand the relation between timescales of rhythm and pitch. This study is pretty fun to think about, but I do have many questions, like how long does it take for listeners to rate the “unpleasant” rhythms “pleasant”? What questions do you have about this work? #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Here’s a tone row (0 1 4 6 7 10 11 12 2 3 5 8 9) I am exploring through my saxophone, voice, and composition practice. This week I’ve been focusing on playing it in the prime form (starting on concert D), retrograde (starting on concert B), inversion (starting on concert ) and retrograde inversion (starting on concert ). One cool aspect of this set of ordered pitches is…if you start at the end points of the row, the intervals are symmetrically moving inward to a midpoint of concert C and Db. I’ve been having so much fun playing this row and putting it in my new string quartet (to be premiered tomorrow at Roulette) that it’s been consuming the energy I would use to read a paper this week. I’ll be back with some brain-related things next week. In the mean time stay safe and please let me know about any rows you’ve been working on! #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone

Well friends, I am happy to say I made it to week 52 practicing these oscillating pulses, and it feels like the journey has just started! I decided to end the series exploring the overtone series again, with a very slow pulse around 60 beats per minute. Taking it slow is my mantra to start the new year. In the sine tones accompanying me, you may be able to hear that the lower one is about 12 cents flat, but the upper one, which also matches the fundamental, is not. This is the most “in tune” appearance of the minor second in the overtone series. I’m using some alternate fingerings to match the lowered partial, and taking it slow helps me really hear and feel that difference.

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There’s a correlate to oscillatory observations in the brain…In 1993 three papers were published on the same topic: the slow 1 oscillation. Found during slow-wave sleep, the slow 1 oscillation got its name from the fact that it only occurs about 1 time per second. These oscillations are associated with delta waves and K-complexes when we’re in non-REM sleep mode. Neuroscientists say a neuron is in its “down state” when it has this lower voltage, almost silent – which happens because of a number of things – the neuron doesn’t have any more resistance to give, more inhibition than excitation around the neuron, and K+ currents that require more attention away from the neuron. Sounds like the way my and many others’ lives are going at this very moment in time – some physical and mental exhaustion. For me, the way this all relates to practicing opens a lot of exciting doors and gives me energy for continuing on. Rather than giving up, the answer is to take it slow. I hope this series of videos has helped you in some way and feel free to leave a question for me here or in my DMs. Have a safe and restful holiday season. #Oscillations2021 #SoloSaxophone