Musical Intelligence "Music Smart" (Part 2): What is Musical Intelligence?

Gardner indicates that "pitch (or melody) and rhythm: sounds emitted at certain auditory frequencies and grouped according to a prescribed system" are most central to the musical intelligence. He explains that pitch is more important in certain cultures. He discusses "Oriental societies that make use of tiny quarter-tone intervals" (1983). Other cultures (such as sub-Saharan Africa) emphasize rhythm where "rhythmic ratios can reach a dizzying metrical complexity" (1983). Gardner discusses the horizontal and vertical organization of music. Horizontal refers to the "relationship of pitches as they unfold over time." Vertical refers to the "effect of two or more sounds emitted at the same time, giving rise to a harmonic or a dissonant sound." Gardner also states that timbre - the characteristic qualities of a tone, is an important element.

Central Elements - "Cores" of Music

• pitch
• rhythm
• timbre

The musical intelligence is central to human experience. It's the earliest of the intelligences to emerge--even children as young as two months old can sing and match rhythmic structures. And it's closely linked to our other intelligences--we often "feel" music with our bodies and move accordingly, we often "feel" music with our emotions, and cry or laugh accordingly. Indeed, as Howard Gardner writes in Frames of Mind (1983), many scientists believe that...

"if we can explain music, we may find the key for all human thought."

Armstrong states that the musical intelligence is the intelligence of tone, rhythm, and timbre.

Music is universal, crossing cultural borders, playing a significant, unifying role in the earliest history of man throughout the world. The components of the musical intelligence, sensitivity to pitch or melody and rhythm, provide the core elements or set of operations. Musical notation provides a complex separate symbol system. Individuals process musical tones in the right hemisphere of the brain, but with formal training and greater competence, musicians utilize the left hemisphere as well (Gardner, 1983, pp.118-119). The musical/rhythmic intelligence is represented in the brain in both the left and right hemispheres, as well as the limbic system (emotional). The more formal and analytical aspects of music as a system are in the left hemisphere and the figural/experiential aspects are in the right hemisphere (Lazear).

Copyright 2003 by Carla Piper, Ed. D.

Edited by: Carol Roger, 2010