eli5 How do we play songs in our head?

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I’m curious:

When you have a song stuck in your head or replay a moment from a song in your head, do we or do we not use our voice box and speech parts of our brains to think the music (like when we speak in our heads to think)?

In: 3

4 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Your brain processes most hearing in your auditory cortex. The music floats through the air, hits your ear, your inner ear vibrates in very specific ways, that vibration is translated to electrical impulses that then travel to this area of your brain. You now have neurons that remember the song. When you “hear” a song in your head, your brain is activating those neurons. They’re just being activated without the input of your ear. But you’re “hearing” it the same way (relatively speaking). So when you hear a song in your head, you’re using the area that handles auditory input and memory. If you thought about yourself singing it, or adding a cool guitar solo, you’d probably incorporate other parts of your brain that handle those functions.

Anonymous 0 Comments

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Anonymous 0 Comments

when you love a song or a good vocal and listen to it many times, it can happen in this spicific song or lyrics

When we hear music in our head we are using our musical imagination. This skill is technically called audiation, and it is the starting point for being able to improvise music or create your own music.

Anonymous 0 Comments

So to ask the next question… how do we make up songs in our head?