Effects of Opera Music from Brain to Body

This book explores the connection between melodrama and medicine from multiple perspectives. Neuroscientists study the relationship between opera and brain functioning in the light of new findings in the fields of neurophysiology, neuroimaging, cognitive science and neuro-musicology; clinicians investigate the therapeutic potential of music, especially in the field of treatment and rehabilitation of individuals with neurodegenerative diseases; medical historians analyse the representation of diseases and those who cure diseases within operas; occupational doctors report descriptions of diseases that affect workers in the opera world and particularly focus on psychiatric and psychological alterations.

Opera, with its instrumental and vocal accompaniment, is considered the most complete form of theatrical performance. However, little is known about the mechanisms of brain activity under the influence of melodrama on singers, musicians, and listeners. The use of neuroimaging techniques has enabled a better understanding of the neuronal mechanisms and circuits involved during an opera performance. Over the past 20 years, melodrama has increasingly been used as a therapeutic approach in various neurological and neuropsychiatric pathologies, such as depression, cognitive impairment, and even coma. 

The book also discusses the ways in which melodrama affects professionals involved in music and interventions to reduce or alleviate occupational diseases, leading to improved health and higher life satisfaction. The ultimate goal is to improve therapeutic interventions in neurological diseases and professional disorders, relying on solid neuroscientific data. 

This book will be of great interest to neurologists, neurobiologists, psychiatrists, occupational doctors and therapists in music.

Lorenzo Lorusso, MD is the Head of the Neurology & Stroke Unit at Merate Hospital of the Neuroscience Dept. - A.S.S.T. -Lecco, Italy. He has main interest in Neuroimmunology and Neurological rare diseases. He was past President of the International Society for the History of the Neuroscience (ISHN) and he was appointed Chairman of the History Committee for the Federation of European Neuroscience Societies (FENS) organizing seminars on History of Neuroscience in the main European cities. He has taught History of Medicine for the University of Milan and he participated as a teacher for courses on the relationship between music and medicine for the University of Milano-Bicocca. He is a melomaniac. Author and co-author of several papers published on national and international journals and of chapters for different books.

Michele Augusto Riva, MD, PhD is Associate Professor of History of Medicine at the University of Milano-Bicocca and Director of the Occupational Health Unit of the Fondazione IRCCS San Gerardo dei Tintori in Monza. He conducted research in different fields of history of medicine, particularly history of neurosciences and history of occupational health. In the period 2009-2015, he was appointed as Chair of ICOH Scientific Committee on History of Prevention of Occupational and Environmental Diseases and during his mandate he co-organized several international conferences around the world on the history of Occupational Health. Author or co-author of about 250 papers in international peer-reviewed journals and book chapters, in the last decade he published different papers on the relationship between medicine and melodrama, being opera definitely one of his passions from a young age.

Vittorio Alessandro Sironi, MD is specialized in Neurosurgery. His main fields of interest are the treatment of several neurosurgical and neurological diseases and neuro-psychiatric disorders, but he is also a medical historian, a medical anthropologist, a writer and essayist, author of more than 30 books and several papers published on national and international scientific journals. He is a lecturer on the relationship between music and the brain at the University of Milano-Bicocca and he is a melomaniac. He is the Scientific Director of the Research Centre on the History of Biomedical Thought of the University of Milano-Bicocca, coordinator of the Study group on the History of Neurosurgery within the Italian Society of Neurosurgery, founder and co-director of the book series Storia della Medicina e della Sanità (Laterza publisher; History of Medicine and Health Care), international collaborator of the Drug Chain Research Programme at the GEIRSO of the Université du Quebec, Montréal and Vice-President of the Association International et Interdisciplinaire sur la Chaîne du Médicaments.