Why Don't Dogs Recognize Music? (and: Why George Harrison is the GOAT)

My dogs are asleep. They look so happy, with sunshine bringing out the contrast between Buddy’s white fur and Sammy’s black fur. It’s a gorgeous scene, you can imagine a piano ballad serenading us in the background.

(this is sam - buddy went downstairs)

I am not listening to a piano ballad. Nope, the speakers are blasting Autocatalytica’s brilliant new math-metal record (https://autocatalytica.bandcamp.com/), basically the noisiest guitars of all time against constant drum shred and a grown man screaming his head off. It’s terrifying. And yet those dogs keep sleeping.

WHAT THE HECK? Why don’t dogs recognize music? I wanted to get to the answer, which is surprisingly simple. Here’s what I learned.

The Dog Sonata

The human brain has, in the words of a Scientific American article, “exquisitely sensitive neurons” relating to pitch recognition. (https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-dogs-dont-enjoy-music/) We can easily hear twelve notes per octave.

In fact, in microtonal music, we double that with quarter-tones and end up with about 22 notes per octave. Ravi Shankar famously introduced the Beatles to this concept, leading to those super eastern sounding Beatles songs.

I’m resisting the urge to geek out about The Beatles here. Fuck. I can’t resist:

GEORGE HARRISON INTERLUDE: Let me just say that George Harrison is a fucking genius for managing to write a microtonal interlude in 5/4 time on Sgt. Pepper, leading billions of people to hear this stuff. Go listen to Within You Without You, and right in the middle, you’ll hear it. It’s a weird rhythm, a slightly microtonal melody, and the only instruments are Sitar, Tabla, and Dillruba. On the most popular and famous album of all time. GENIUS.
Anyway, dogs can’t hear any of that. They can only hear about three notes per octave. The next time that you sit at a piano, hit three notes - and imagine that’s all of music. That’s what it is for dogs.

That didn’t stop Kirk Nurock, a reasonably successful composer, from writing the Sonata for Piano and Dog in 1983. I… don’t think I want to hear it. He even wrote a song for three dogs, who were supposed to bark and howl throughout the piece.

Music for Monkeys

David Teie took a different approach to animal music. He learned about the Tamarin, a monkey with a rapid heartbeat and ridiculously high pitched voice. After doing his research, he wrote several pieces of music for the monkeys. (http://www.livescience.com/33780-animal-music-pets.html)

The study was a success! David’s faster song made the Tamarins become agitated and energetic. When the music was switched to the monkey equivalent of a ballad, they became more lethargic.

This study’s innovation was to write music that matched the animal’s bodily rhythm. The songs were high pitched and fast. Any human would hear it as chipmunk music. However, since the monkeys have double speed heartbeats and such high voices, it sounded natural to them.

Animals Don’t Have Musical Brains

Most animals just don’t have the right brains to hear music. They can’t process auditory information in a way that is pleasant.

Only bats can hear pitch better than humans, and they use that to navigate caves. If you play bats some bat music, they’re all gonna crash and burn.

In the end, it makes sense that humans can enjoy sound differently from dogs. Dogs enjoy eating poop, but that doesn’t mean we need to try it. Let’s agree to disagree with our canine friends in terms of what we like to do for recreation. Diversity is a good thing.

What do you think? Does your pet have a unique reaction to music, or do you know some info that I left out? Give me your thoughts in the comments.