Prenatal Music For Fetal Development

Prenatal music prepares the ear, body and brain to listen to, integrate and produce language sounds. Music can thus be considered a pre-linguistic language which is nourishing and stimulating to the whole human being, affecting body, emotions, intellect, and developing an internal sense of beauty, sustaining and awakening the qualities in us that are wordless and otherwise inexpressible.

Prenatal Music

The sound environment of the womb is very rich. There are various interpretations as to the noise level, ranging between 30 to 96 dB. (decibel being a measure of sound intensity or loudness). A whisper can register 30 dB., a normal conversation is about 60 dB. and rush hour traffic can average about 70 dB. On the other hand, shouted conversations and motorcycles reach about 100 dB. Rock music has been measured as 115 dB. and the pain threshold begins at 125 dB. Yet, recent research with hydrophones have revealed that the womb is a “relatively quiet place”, somewhere between 50 and 60 dB. Uterine sounds form a “sound carpet” over which the mother’s voice in particular appears very distinct and which the prenate gives special attention because it is so different from its own amniotic environment.

Prenatal sounds form an important developmental component in prenatal life because they provide a foundation for later learning and behavior. With fetal sound stimulation the brain functions at a higher level of organization. The ear first appears in the 3rd week of gestation and it becomes functional by the 16th week. The fetus begins active listening by the 24th week.

“Music sets up a certain vibration which unquestionably results in a physical reaction.” The ear is primarily a generator of energy for the brain. Thus the powerful connection between sound/music and prenatal memory/learning have been revealed in formal experiments, parental observations, clinical records, and first person reports.

Hence our ultimate objective, of course is to help create not a musical genius but a person well integrated in his physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual self.

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