Music Synchronizes the Brains of Performers and Their Audience

A new paper in the journal NeuroImage has shown that this synchrony can be seen in the brain activities of the audience and performer. And the greater the degree of synchrony, the study found, the more the audience enjoys the performance. 

Synchronous brain activity was localized in the left hemisphere of the brain, to an area known as the temporal-parietal junction. This area is important for empathy, the understanding of others’ thoughts and intentions, and verbal working memory used for expressing thought. It may function in the retrieval of sounds and patterns that give rise to musical expectations.

By Robert Martone, Scientific American