Does a life of active involvement in music bestow enhanced memory – more able to withstand the ravages of age? Nina Kraus of the Audio Neuroscience Laboratory at Northwestern University in Illinois certainly believes so. Why not listen to a short conversation she had with Eddie Mair on Radio 4’s PM? Scroll forward to 27:50 of this?

The website of the Audio Neuroscience Laboratory is a treasure trove of interesting material.

There is an interesting paragraph about the effects of music on the brain here

Also – have a look at this slide show about the brain’s encoding of music and speech – or the slide show about speech in noise.

There are also three interesting videos on the site:

• Music and the brain
• Brain-stem responses to complex sounds
• Music and language shape how we hear (this one describes how the study of music and language benefit many seemingly unrelated and indispensible disciplines and skills)