Musical Beginnings

From where, and by what mechanisms, does an individual's musical ability originate? This is a subject of major interest both to developmental and music psychologists, heightened by the recent research into the prenatal perception of sound. Seeking an answer to this question, this study reviews such central issues as prenatal auditory experience through infancy and early childhood. The chapters chart developmental progress due to the child's changing environment: from the uterus; through the intense and semi-exclusive mother-baby bond; to the wider contexts provided by family, school and society at large. The book provides the most up-to-date integration of developmental and musical psychology.