I respect anyone with a more diverse taste in music that me, and Levitin fits the bill. In fact, having read the first sentence of the book, I wonder if anyone alive listens to a broader array of tunes than he does.

Unfortunately, this book wasn’t what I expected. Given his vocation (Professor of Psychology, Neuroscience, and Music at McGill University), I expected more science and less conjecture. This book relies quite heavily on personal anecdotes and conversations with musicians to move it along. There were times when the length of some stories felt like he was grasping for content.

The most fascinating part of the book was how he reached cross-genre to provide examples for his various categories—friendship, joy, comfort, knowledge, religion and love. If only he had more killer and less filler!

Levitin, Daniel J. The World in Six Songs: How the Musical Brain Created Human Nature. Viking Canada, 2008.