Sunday Feature

In the Beginning was the Song

Sunday 9 December 2007 21:35-22:20 (Radio 3)

Ivan Hewett explores the origins and evolution of music.

The urge to make music is rooted deep in human nature. But why that urge arose in the first place is a hotly debated question, which divides the scientific community. Is music a useless by-product of evolution, as renowned cognitive scientist Steven Pinker says? Or is it a vitally important faculty that helped humanity to flourish, as archeologist Steven Mithen and many others believe?
Ivan Hewett goes in search of the answer, drawing on a fascinating body of evidence that ranges from Paleolithic cave settlements and observations of apes making music, to laboratory studies of infants' musical abilities, and a new brain-scanning experiment to map the neural basis of the music faculty.


Click here to see production stills from Ivan Hewett's journey into the evolution of music

Duration:

45 minutes

Sunday Feature

Episode and Playlist Information

• 20 Jan 08 Missing Moscow
• 13 Jan 08 Rules of Engagement
• 6 Jan 08 Bosphorous Battles
• 30 Dec 07 Oscar in America
• 23 Dec 07 A Cloud...
• 16 Dec 07 RAND
• 9 Dec 07 The origins of music
• 2 Dec 07 Liquid Living
• 25 Nov 07 Poetic World of Newt
• 18 Nov 07 As Big as Life

Sunday Feature pages