Partial Amusia?

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"Amusia refers to a number of disorders which impair music processing such as the inability to recognize musical tones or rhythms or to reproduce them."

Is it possible to be able to hear and understand music, but not be able to produce any music your self?

I can hear music but I have never been able to play any instruments or keep up a beat through other means (I can't even really tap on the desk to make basic beats(if I tap its more of a stim)). But if I can visually see where each element of the music goes, then I can (not in real-time)create music, like on the computer with Garage Band for example.

I thought this was pretty common. I can hear music, but I can't really play it, and, although I've been in a choir for a while, I sing out of key pretty much (the choir has always been very noncompetitive).

I admit complete innability to create musical sound must be rare, but don't be afraid if you ask me, it doesn't put you much behind, for most people have poor skill in most musical talent (in other word can have a good one but poor in the rest).

My NT mother's poor sense of timing didn't stop her from singing opera, and very well at it. Her geeky NT brother played bass. What does this prove? Nothing, really, outside of amusia not being linked to ASD.

Wow, thanks for posting. I've never heard of the term amusia, it's random conditions like that that me love medicine

I don't have it personally, on the contrary I am slightly pitch perfect (developing it).

I can kind of understand not being able to do it unless you can see it. I am very visual, so music and writing kind of seem like they have a fog around them compared to, like, drawing or building something. But I'm still able to do them a bit if I try.

PS check this out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVadl4ocX0M

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPRW0wZ9NOM


Here's Oliver Sacks talking about amusia.

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On a piano I can play a melody with my right hand (in a way) yet I cannot chord well with my left hand and integrate smoothly both hands together.

Have always tended to read from a music sheet and play music from a music sheet only (never from musical memory due to a known imperfect musical memory).

When beating my foot to the music, my right foot tends to beat evenly, my left foot does not.

When I listen to a song with words and music in the background, I tend to naturally listen to the background music vs the words.

If musical words are sung without music at all, I tend to process part of the words if the words resemble speech; if the words are drawn out over seconds, I tend not to process the words because the words go outside of a very short working memory attention span.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_and_the_brain
http://www.ericdigests.org/2003-5/auditory.htm

I would desperately love to be more proficient in this area, I can get VERY NICE tunes in my head that isn't just recreating what I've heard before but completely original. I'm guessing that this is only kind of related to what the OP was talking about. I've got a fantom x8 and I it is so hard for me to make music on it. Other people seem to do it easier, but I think the difference is that they don't try to be perfectionist about it, instead putting patterns together until they come up with something they are satisfied with it...or so I'm guessing.

I've never heard of this before. I can sing in tune if I hear the music and I'm pretty good with pitch, but playing music is very difficult for me. Sometimes when I play with the metronome it sounds like the rhythm morphs and slows down and then speeds up and so on. It's daunting and it's nothing wrong with the metronome. It's like my perception sort of uneasily modulates.

hmmm, sounds like something i might have

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Attempted to look at this question of how the human brain/mind keeps a steady musical rhythm and my preliminary feeling is that part of it may have to do with the cerebellum.

If it has to do with vision which seems to change/things appear smaller and larger than usual it may have to do with an unusual kind of epilepsy called Alice In Wonderland syndrome.

http://www.epilepsyontario.org/client/E ... d+Syndrome

Have attempted to discuss part of this with a neurologist but the neurologist I saw at a HMO felt my questions were a little too technical in nature and he suggested I go to a medical research university and try to find a doctor who perhaps had an interest in the questions. This would likely mean me paying extra money outside of what is covered under the HMO health care policy I have so I decided against it. I tended to view what happened as a pass the buck/avoid the specific neurological questions I had approach which I did not care for since I feel that a HMO should try to answer real questions about neurology rather than ask a person to go outside the system and pay for it elsewhere.

Wow, thanks. I always get that sort of shifting in size sensation where I feel larger or smaller and everything around me changes accordingly. It's really trippy. I didn't know there was a name for it or that it could possibly be related to other types of shifts in perception. Huh.