Did music predate language?

Across the world sociologists and anthropologists have yet to find a single culture that through human history had no association with music. Primates and even animals and birds have communicated using musical sounds and we know that. Tempo and pitch changes communicate dangers of various kinds. A controversial question raised is if music in fact predated language! Archaeological evidence for musical activities pre-dates even the earliest known cave art. Human culture as has been studied by scientists from various disciplines hasnt encountered one that didn’t practice a recognisable musical activity. Music has been SUBJECT OF KEEN INVESTIGATION across diverse fields as neuroscience, psychology, ethnography and musicology. Researchers ask if there was a “moment” when musical behaviours emerged as an activity, and separable from other activities. But it doesn’t seem to be so clear and separated. Fossil records of bipedal ape-like human ancestors indicate a vocal anatomy and neurological structure that isn’t significantly different from the great apes of today. But by the time of pre Neanderthal ancestors studies reveal a significant change in vocal anatomy and neurological control over it, similar to modern human-like auditory physiology. Studies of homoergaster fossils indicate a change in structure of the larynx and increased super laryngeal soundspace. Scientists claim this allowed a wider range of sounds and frequencies, but a thoraxic innervation like in humans, allowing control over utterances of lengthy durations probably emerged in Neanderthals. It was probably a million years ago that a re-arrangement of the laryngeal anatomy coupled with neurological control over pitch, volume, contour and duration of sounds produced, happened to have evolved. This evolution has to be read in consonance with structural changes in neurological anatomy and the behaviours too. Fossil studies and interpretations reveal development of regions in the left hemisphere of the brain – Broca’s area as it is referred to. This part is associated with fine muscular control of sequences of vocalisations and manual muscular movements. These regions are involved in, and subtly direct social communication, planning and performance of complex motor sequences which are essential elements of musical activity. To be exact scientifically let me paraphrase what stalwarts in this field like Juergens, Zwirner, Schulz and others have explained – “the motor planning of purposeful utterances rely mainly on input to the motor cortex and the natural integration of emotional content into vocalisations relies on input from the anterior limbic cortex and PAG (periaqueductal grey matter). Thus, vocal control, expiratory control, orofacial muscular control and overall control of the laryngeal system has developed in the human anatomy as evolutionary process”. Humans are the only primates that possess the neurological connection that regulates sound produced from the larynx with the controls mentioned above. A third anatomical aspect that also needs a mention here is the transformation of the middle and inner ear – form and structure. The middle ear is sensitive to the range of frequencies humans commonly use. The stapedius muscles of the middle year contract to reduce movement of the stapes bones on the eardrum during vocalisation, thus reducing the intensity of perception of own vocalisations. This, as can be imagined, reduced the extent to which individual vocalisations obscured prevailing environmental sounds. Thus, researchers have safely assumed that this evolution has been finely tuned to the processing demands of musical stimuli. The structures used for music processing and production are also used in processing and producing other aspects of communication but there may be a unique combination that focusses on musical activities alone. Researchers have now dug themselves deep into this very interesting subject. There should be many more hypothesis and counter-theories as studies progress. While archaeological studies and excavations will help a study of what remains, sound logical hypothesis must be added to the study of the physical remains to make the propositions. Studies also describe based on a closer observation of existing tribes across the world scuh as the native Americans, Aka and Mbuti pygmies of Africa, Pintupi aborigines from Australia, or the Yupik and Innuit tribes, rhythm and instruments could have been used as part of musical discourse or performances. It has been assumed that they were either made of wood, or stone, or even hide of an animal, but were not sophisticated. Evidence wouldn’t exist too. In the midst of this agreeable conclusion, Dr. Nicholas Conrad, H. Jenson and Friedrich Seeberger of Germany reported the discovery of three flutes in a cave near Ulm, Germany. Dating the deposits where the flutes were found suggests the instruments to be anywhere around 40,000 years old. This date takes us right upto the Paleolithic age of the last Ice age – a time when Neanderthals and Homosapiens co-existed! The flutes were made of ivory, not of elephants but a woolly mammal. The tusks were not hollow. They were cut into halves, hollowed and glued airtight together. Holes were drilled at appropriate distances, and the sound produced on a replica by Dr Seeberger was very harmonic, and followed the pentatonic scale that is followed in India. These are clearly products of complex production processes. Considerable amount of time and energy would have been invested into researching, identifying and finally settling down on a specific design. Researches also reveal that homosapiens made deliberate use of acoustic properties of cave sites as well as resonant properties of stalagmites stalactites. Music didn’t seem a trivial leisure in their lives. Excavations in Jiahu, China led to discovering intact flutes that were 9,000 years old. These flutes were made of the bones of cranes. A two volume Wuyang-Jiahu was published by the Science Press of Beijing after more than a decade’s study after the excavation discoveries. Having well developed five-tone, six-tone and seven-tone scales and set to a specific pitch, music seems to have been a rather evolved science much earlier than expected. These discoveries have helped rewrite history of the Qin dynasty where research previously asserted only a five-tone scale was in use in China. Infact the tones of the Jiahu flute are based on the twelve tone equally tempered scale. We seem now to look at the origin of music from a study of biology, archaeology and anthropology! Interesting!