Cross, Ian - Is music the most important thing we ever did ? Music, development and evolution
(In Music, Mind and Science, 1999, Ed. Suk Won Yi, Seoul: Seoul National University Press, snubook@plaza.snu.ac.kr)

According to Steve Pinker (1997) "As far as biological cause and effect is concerned, music is useless". In fact, as Steven Feld notes (Feld, 1982), music can be downright dangerous; in the Kaluli longhouse ceremonies that he describes, music could result in severe burns for the performers, inflicted by listeners as punishment for having been moved to tears by the music. And yet, to move the listeners to tears was precisely the intent of the performers. Why did they do it? More generally, why do we do it? For music appears to be humanly universal - according to Blacking (1995) all human societies of which we have knowledge appear to have music - yet the practice of music, even if not as physically hazardous as it can be amongst the Kaluli appears on the surface to offer no benefits to our continued survival. But we started doing it and we continue to do it. From an evolutionary perspective the question must be: "Why?".