Notes and Neurons
Music is a universal language. I have become amazed by Bobby McFerrin because the way he sees music is through the eyes of a child. You may recognixe his name from ‘Don’t Worry Be Happy‘. When you were young, everything excited you, and everything seemed ‘awesome’ and ‘different’. As we grow, we tend to stop being surprised, trying new things, and staying interested. Its important to never lose that – and Bobby McFerrin hasn’t.
World Science Festival 2009: Bobby McFerrin Demonstrates the Power of the Pentatonic Scale from World Science Festival on Vimeo.
He also has another performance where he beat boxes, which blew me away! But this time The World Science Fair was his stage during his pentatonic scale audience song. As the name implies – the scale is called ‘Penta’ because it has 5 notes in it, and the audience fills up the other notes without his assistance. It shows the universal understanding of music, the power of what it can do to us, and the wave of emotion and awe it can leave us with.
Big thanks to my good friend Jack Sparks for letting me know about this!
Jenna Wortham and I
(L to R) Sonali Bijor from 











