https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_musicology

An introduction to evolutionary musicology

Abstract

In this introduction to the new field of evolutionary musicology, we see that thestudy of music origins provides a fresh and exciting approach to the under-standing of human evolution, a topic that so far has been dominated by a focuson language evolution. The language-centered view of humanity has to beexpanded to include music, first, because the evolution of language is highly inter-twined with the evolution of music, and, second, because music provides a spe-cific and direct means of exploring the evolution of human social structure, groupfunction, and cultural behavior. Music making is the quintessential human cul-tural activity, and music is an ubiquitous element in all cultures large and small.The study of music evolution promises to shed light on such important issues asevolution of the hominid vocal tract; the structure of acoustic-communicationsignals; human group structure; division of labor at the group level; the capacityfor designing and using tools; symbolic gesturing; localization and lateralizationof brain function; melody and rhythm in speech; the phrase-structure of lan-guage; parent-infant communication; emotional and behavioral manipulationthrough sound; interpersonal bonding and synchronization mechanisms; self-expression and catharsis; creativity and aesthetic expression; the human affinityfor the spiritual and the mystical; and finally, of course, the universal humanattachment to music itself.
http://neuroarts.org/pdf/origins_intro.pdf
http://monoskop.org/images/b/b1/Wallin_Merker_Brown_The_Origins_of_Music.pdf