From: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council
Date published: 10/31/2025 9:00:00 AM | Date modified: 10/31/2025 9:00:00 AM
Researcher Daniel Levitin in his lab at McGill University, with musician Sting.
Photo: McGill University
If you ask neuroscientist Daniel Levitin how he ended up spending his life scanning brains to study the power of music, he’ll tell you that, initially, he played the wrong chord.
“I dropped out of college after my sophomore year and became a record producer. I had some good clients,” he says with a smirk. “Like Santana and the Grateful Dead.”
Even with that famous lineup, Levitin says when the record industry began to crumble due to the digital transformation in the early 1990s, he decided to go back to school.
“I started a dual major in psychology and music and I was having so much fun that I decided to go to graduate school.”
That decision led the American-born musician (and grandson of a Canadian) to a career that would make him a world-renowned researcher on the connection between music and the brain—and a scientist Canada proudly claims as its own.
Levitin was hired at Montréal’s McGill University in 1999 and quickly secured funding for the Levitin Lab for Cognitive Neuroscience. His move from the United States to Canada gave him “rockstar status” in the research realm, prompting McGill to make him the literal poster child for its fundraising campaign. His face appeared painted, turntable-style, several storeys high on downtown Toronto buildings.
“It was so unusual to have someone come from the US to a Canadian institution. They called it a ‘reverse brain drain.’ I got a lot of press—and that brought a lot of attention to the field.”
Around that time, Levitin secured his first major Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) grant that would put him—and music cognition—firmly on the map.
Daniel Levitin working in his lab at McGill University.
Photo: Owen Egan
That early project, The Psychology of Musical Abilities in Individuals with Williams Syndrome, was groundbreaking. Williams syndrome, a rare genetic condition affecting about one in 20,000 people, often results in developmental disabilities and severe motor challenges—yet those with the condition are strikingly musical.
“People with Williams syndrome may not be able to tie their shoes or feed themselves independently, but they can play the clarinet beautifully,” explains Levitin.
He and his team were the first to scan the brains of people with Williams syndrome as they listened to music. What they discovered changed how scientists think about intelligence itself.
“What we saw was the first clear-cut brain imaging evidence that intelligence is not monolithic,” Levitin explains. “You can have people who can’t tell time on a clock, but who can keep perfect musical time. Their brains are organized differently.”
That insight broadened researchers’ understanding of human and animal abilities, empathy, and even consciousness.
Levitin’s discoveries have helped him pen several books, including his most recent, I Heard There Was A Secret Chord (Penguin Random House, 2024), partly supported by SSHRC, which brings together decades of evidence showing how music can treat disorders like anxiety, depression and chronic pain.
“Medicine is evidence-based and there is now strong evidence for the medical benefits of music,” says Levitin.
His research explores how rhythm and melody can heal both body and mind. His lab has shown, through the SSHRC-funded The Social Psychology of Musical Engagement project, that scientifically selected music can lower a person’s heart rate and blood pressure. His experiments laid the foundation for work showing that songwriting supports veterans with posttraumatic stress disorder, and that music helps people with Parkinson’s disease regain movement.
“If we play music that has the same tempo as Parkinson’s patients’ natural walking gait, within a few seconds healthy brain tissue unaffected by the disease can synchronize to that beat. They start walking again. It’s a game changer!” says Levitin.
In 2007, when his first best-selling book This Is Your Brain on Music (Penguin, 2006) turned him into a science celebrity, one famous reader—Sting—reached out. The rock legend asked if Levitin would scan his brain.
“So we scanned Sting’s brain and we wrote a paper about it,” laughs the not-usually-star-struck Levitin.
The scans showed, when Sting imagined music in his head, the patterns in his brain were virtually identical to those when he actually heard it.
“We saw how his brain organized songs—by rhythm, chord progression and feel. It was like a filing cabinet of music,” explains Levitin.
The scan sparked a true friendship—and a deeper understanding of the music-mind connection.
“Sting’s scan tells us how music is organized in memory, and where memories reside in the brain,” says Levitin.
Musician Joni Mitchell at McGill University.
Levitin’s stardom has brought global attention to neuroscience—and inspired a new generation of scientists. His McGill colleague and former Canada Research Chair in Genetics of Pain, Professor Jeff Mogil, says for a decade, one-quarter of all of McGill’s psychology and neuroscience applicants wrote in their personal essays they wanted to enter the field after reading Levitin’s work.
After hundreds of interviews, four New York Times bestsellers, and countless studies, Levitin still talks about music with the enthusiasm of a lifelong fan.
“I’m so passionate about this research that I would do it for free. I love music,” he smiles.
The melodies and rhythms of music, he says, are a lens into memory, emotion and empathy.
“Music releases oxytocin, the bonding hormone, and prolactin, a tranquilizing hormone that can soothe us when we’re sad.”
But most importantly, Levitin believes, music may just be humanity’s most powerful instrument.
“Music can be the great engine of social change. It reminds us that, despite all our differences, we can still find harmony.”
Check out Daniel Levitin’s other best-selling books on navigating a world of information overload, successful aging and critical thinking. Or listen to Levitin’s solo albums or TED Talk: How to Stay Calm When You Know You’ll be Stressed.
