Have you ever marveled at the brilliance, precision and ease of a seasoned singer singing an intricate musical piece? Largely, the ability to sing at a high level is closely related to how singing training shapes the brain. By engaging in singing training, our brain undergoes a series of structural and functional changes to adapt to new circumstances, challenges and demands; this brain malleability is known as neuroplasticity. Over time, these brain changes support increasingly complex and versatile singing skills, made possible by the refinement of sensory processing, fine-tuned interactions between sensory stimuli and motor commands, as well as advanced motor planning and execution. These emerging neural pathways equip a singer to perform a wide array of musical repertoire with accuracy, consistency and mastery. In addition to singers, athletes and other types of musicians also experience neuroplasticity by engaging in sport and music training (Chang, 2014).

Singing might feel natural and easy to some people, whereas others might struggle with it and consider themselves tone-deaf. Nevertheless, research shows that those who struggle tend to underestimate their musical skills (Wise, 2019). In fact, people with no singing training can sometimes sing as well as singers in certain conditions, such as when singing a well-known song that carries a simple melody (Dalla Bella et al., 2007). Thus, “good singing” might be accessible to more people than previously thought. 

In one of my studies, two groups of participants with and without prior singing training – referred to as singers and non-singers – sang two types of melodies that varied in their level of difficulty (i.e., easy and difficult melodies) inside an MRI brain scanner, to examine pitch accuracy and brain activity during singing. When participants sang easy melodies, non-singers were as accurate as singers. However, when singing difficult melodies, non-singers were significantly less accurate than singers. On that note, it was only with difficult melodies that significant differences in brain activity were found across groups (Vivero, 2024). On one hand, similar singing accuracy on both groups for easy melodies might reflect that most people have a baseline for singing, from where progress can be built upon. On the other hand, different singing accuracy between groups for difficult melodies might reflect a gap between a baseline for singing versus a learned set of skills for singing, developed over time through singing training, and presumably supported by the ways in which the brain changes following singing training. What do these changes look like in the brain of a singer? A couple of examples are presented below.  

The singer’s brain seems to have a sophisticated mechanism – led by the right anterior insula – to adapt to auditory and somatosensory perturbations in order to preserve singing performance. During singing, the right anterior insula appears to play a role in integrating sensory inputs and using this information to increase reliance on somatosensory feedback, when auditory feedback is defective (Kleber et al., 2013; 2017). This mechanism might help singers stay in tune when they cannot hear their voice clearly. In addition, the singer’s brain might benefit from an enhanced connection between frontal and temporal brain regions, by counting on an anatomically modified left arcuate fasciculus. The left arcuate fasciculus is a robust bundle of fibers that enables direct communication between Broca’s and Wernicke’s area, regions involved in speech production and language comprehension, respectively. In singers, the dorsal branch of the left arcuate fasciculus was found to present morphological differences, relative to non-musicians and instrumentalists. These differences have been associated with the effects of long-term singing training (Halwani et al., 2011) and might allow singers to better link perceptual and motor aspects of singing. 

Certainly, singing training is a powerful tool to shape the brain. As you continue to engage in singing training, your brain gradually adapts to your deliberate practice and your committed efforts in honing your craft. The good news is that most people might have a chance to improve their singing and change their brain by doing so, one song at a time! 

REFERENCES

Chang, Y. (2014). Reorganization and plastic changes of the human brain associated with skill learning and expertise. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 8, 35.

Dalla Bella, S., Giguère, J.-F., & Peretz, I. (2007). Singing proficiency in the general population. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 121(2), 1182–1189.

Halwani, G. F., Loui, P., Rueber, T., & Schlaug, G. (2011). Effects of Practice and Experience on the Arcuate Fasciculus: Comparing Singers, Instrumentalists, and Non Musicians. Frontiers in Psychology, 2.

Kleber, B., Friberg, A., Zeitouni, A., & Zatorre, R. (2017). Experience-dependent modulation of right anterior insula and sensorimotor regions as a function of noise masked auditory feedback in singers and nonsingers. NeuroImage, 147, 97–110.

Kleber, B., Zeitouni, A. G., Friberg, A., & Zatorre, R. J. (2013). Experience-Dependent Modulation of Feedback Integration during Singing: Role of the Right Anterior Insula. Journal of Neuroscience, 33(14), 6070–6080.

Vivero, M. (2024). Neurophysiological substrates of singing associated with past singing experience and task difficulty [Doctoral dissertation, University of Delaware]. ProQuest Dissertations & Theses.