* Music Resources

Originally published in 1906, this book is essentially a how to guide on music appreciation. Includes sections on the pianoforte, orchestral, and vocal music. Good for anyone who wishes for a greater appreciation of the wonders of music.

This book is "not written for professional musicians, but for untaught lovers of the art". It gives broad instruction on composers, styles, instruments, venues - and when to believe the critics.

It was not until 1914, when Professor Karl Gehrkens at the Oberlin School of Music published this compilation of class notes and sources he collected over the years, that a uniform text became available for schools and universities everywhere. Since the publication of this monumental work, similar textbooks have emerged, but Dr. Gehrkens’ contribution remains thoroughly worthwhile—particularly since it provides not just the definitions of musical terms, but also the historical context of those terms.

Like an actor's script, a sheet of music instructs a musician on what to play (the pitch) and when to play it (the rhythm). Sheet music may look complicated, but once you've gotten the hang of a few simple elements like notes, bars and clefs, you're ready to rock. Tim Hansen hits the instrumental basics you need to read music.

In this talk, musician and educator Anita Collins makes a passionate case for music education as an indispensable part of school curricula, describing how learning to play music is the neurological equivalent of a full-body workout.

Music has the power to transform moods, unite crowds and topple governments. However, as neuroscientist and operatic soprano Indre Viskontas points out, we know very little about how the brain turns strings of sounds into music. In a talk that explores art with science, she describes how her investigation into the brain's responses to music inspired her own musical journey.

Singing in Spanish, Portuguese and English, LADAMA brings a vibrant, energizing and utterly danceable musical set to the TED stage. In between performances of their songs "Night Traveler" and "Porro Maracatu," they discuss how cross-cultural musical collaboration can empower communities.

Inventor of electronic instruments and DJ, Tim Exile, believes if we listen, we can make music from the noises we hear every day. In this live performance, he takes sounds recorded from around the TED@Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany conference and mixes them in-front of the audience to create a one of a kind audio track.

One night in 2002, a friend gave Jorge Drexler the chorus to a song and challenged him to write the rest of it using a complex, poetic form known as the "Décima." In this fascinating talk, Drexler examines the blended nature of identity, weaving together the history of the Décima with his own quest to write one. He closes the talk with a performance of the resulting song, "La Milonga del Moro Judío." (In Spanish with English subtitles)

Creative technologist Peter Kirn contemplates the intimate connection between the corporeal and emotional worlds through music. He discusses the physical impact of Beethoven's symphonies, concluding with a live demonstration of an instrument that registers the body's response and generates sound based solely on his physical movements.

Vincent Moon travels the world with a backpack and a camera, filming astonishing music and ritual the world rarely sees -- from a powerful Sufi ritual in Chechnya to an ayahuasca journey in Peru. He hopes his films can help people see their own cultures in a new way, to make young people say: "Whoa, my grandfather is as cool as Beyoncé." Followed by a mesmerizing performance by jazz icon Naná Vasconcelos.

In this lovely talk, TED Fellow Ryan Holladay shares his experiment with "location-aware music." This programming and musical feat involves hundreds of geotagged segments of sounds that only play when a listener is physically nearby, creating a magical sense of presence.

When Robert Gupta was caught between a career as a doctor and as a violinist, he realized his place was in the middle, with a bow in his hand and a sense of social justice in his heart. He tells a moving story of society's marginalized and the power of music therapy, which can succeed where conventional medicine fails.

Designer Jared Ficklin creates wild visualizations that let us see music, using color and even fire (a first for the TED stage) to analyze how sound makes us feel. He takes a brief digression to analyze the sound of a skatepark -- and how audio can clue us in to developing creativity.

"Music is everywhere, and it is in everything," says musician, student and TED-Ed Clubs star Anika Paulson. Guitar in hand, she plays through the beats of her life in an exploration of how music connects us and makes us what we are.