A Polyphony of Dimensions: Music, Pain, and Aesthetic Perception

Link: http://mmd.iammonline.com.libproxy.wlu.ca/index.php/musmed/article/view/MMD-2012-4-3-6/196

Citation: Metzner, S. (2012). A Polyphony of Dimensions: Music, Pain, and Aesthetic Perception. Music and Medicine, 4(3), 163-170.
Affiliation: University of Applied Sciences, Magdeburg, Germany

Abstract: The article addresses the phenomenon of pain and the music therapeutic treatment of pain, with consideration of the involved
functional and representational brain functions and its connected epistemological problems. A 2-fold description of the therapeutic
process is presented whereby a transmodal process linking affective–sensory pain with audio music experience and an assignment
of musical symbols to pain lead to a modification of the pain experience. A theory of aesthetic perception serves as the
framework and as a platform for interdisciplinary discussion.

Keywords: music-imaginative pain treatment, cross-modal processes, symbolic representation, theory of aesthetic perception