The Cognitive Symphony of Culture and Music

Music is a universal feature of the human experience — present from our very first cultures and civilisations.

But do the features of particular songs and styles translate across cultural boundaries? Like, is a lullaby recognisable even when it's from a different culture? Can you identify a love song in another language?

Today, we explore the special relationship between music and our minds, in an episode from Radio New Zealand's Our Changing World.

Our Changing World is produced and presented by Claire Concannon and Ellen Rykers for RNZ.

The clips from the Natural History of Song project used in this episode are available online under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0.

The original version of this episode was first broadcast on RNZ as Our Musical Minds.