What are the cognitive and biological mechanisms that are essential to perceive, make, and appreciate music? Only when we have identified these fundamental mechanisms are we in a position to see how these might have evolved. However, it is still a challenge to demarcate precisely what makes up this complex trait we call musicality. Or simply put: without musicality, there is no music. Musicality – in all its complexity – can be defined as a natural, spontaneously developing set of traits based on and constrained by our biological and cognitive system, and music – in all its variety – as a social and cultural construct based on musicality. In trying to answer this question, it is important to separate between the notions of "music" and "musicality". Can birdsong, the song structure of humpback whales, a Thai elephant orchestra, or the interlocking duets of Gibbons be considered music? This is now generally seen as a pitfall. Many studies on the cognitive and biological origins of music are centered on the question of what defines music. Two types of musicality may be differentiated: to be able to perceive music (musical receptivity) and to be able to reproduce music in addition to creating music (musical creativity). A person considered musical has the ability to perceive and reproduce differences in aspects of music including pitch, rhythm, and harmony (see: ear training). In the company of two or more musicians, there is the added experience of the ensemble effect in which the players express something greater than the sum of their individual parts. Judges of contest music may describe a performance as bringing the music on the page to life of expressing more than the mere faithful reproduction of pitches, rhythms, and composer dynamic markings. These definitions are somewhat hampered by the difficulty of defining music, but, colloquially, "music" is often contrasted with noise and randomness. Let’s look at each of these in turn and see how they contribute to being musical.Musicality ( music -al -ity) is "sensitivity to, knowledge of, or talent for music" or "the quality or state of being musical", and is used to refer to specific if vaguely defined qualities in pieces and/or genres of music, such as melodiousness and harmoniousness. Here (in no particular order) are some of the skills we believe are important parts of musicality: We’ve unpacked that into a large number of specific skills and explored each of these here on the blog in our “Musicality Means” series and we have a Musicality Status Check for our members to see which areas they want to focus on improving next. Here at Musical U we like this short and simple definition: Musicality is a set of “inner skills” which let you freely and confidently express yourself in music. Chad West who regularly presents on the subject of modern musicianship defines 5 “Big Skills” which contribute to musicality and go way beyond instrument technique or being born talented. However, there is something valuable in those talent-based definitions: they capture the ineffable quality of musicality, the fact that it isn’t a simple yes/no quality, nor something you can fully define in a single sentence. ![]() So we’re not keen on definitions of musicality which imply it’s a “gift” or something innate rather than learnable. If you’ve been following our blog then you know we at Musical U can’t stand the Talent Myth and think “talent” doesn’t compare to practice for becoming a great musician. ![]() The Oxford Dictionary gets a bit mystical, saying musicality is “Musical talent or sensitivity” giving examples: “her beautiful, rich tone and innate musicality” and “his compositions reveal an exceptional degree of innate musicality”. Wikipedia has a slightly flimsy page, drawing on the Merriam-Webster definition: “Musicality is “sensitivity to, knowledge of, or talent for music” or “the quality or state of being musical”.” So let’s take this opportunity to explore: what is musicality? By using this short and simple word we risk overlooking many of the dimensions and subtleties it’s used to represent. Like all catch-all terms though, there is a downside to the convenience. It encompasses many of the skills we help people to learn at Musical U. Musicality is a very useful catch-all for “being musical”.
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