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New Orleans. Just hearing the city’s name brings music to mind. This is, after all, where jazz was born. On any given day, music flows out of clubs in the French Quarter and beyond. What a tailor-made place to study music and the brain, I thought. So I reached out to a local neuroscientist during a recent visit.
Paul Colombo, PhD, grew up near Buffalo, New York. He trained in neuroscience at the University of California at Berkeley under Professor Mark Rosenzweig, a pioneer in the field. Rosenzweig’s research showed that rich, stimulating environments can change the brain, even in adults, by increasing brain volume and improving brain function. This ability of the brain to change is known as neuroplasticity.
When Dr. Colombo set out to find a full-time job, he ruled out returning to northern climes and accepted a position at Tulane University. He was drawn not only by the warm weather but also by NOLA’s strong music culture—as a drummer, the city’s musical energy appealed to him.
Nevertheless, Dr. Colombo did not begin to study music and the brain until later in his career. Trained in cellular neuroscience, he focused for the first half of his professional life on how memory works at the cellular and genetic levels. In a study with young and old rats, he found that memory formation is related to concentrations of an enzyme, protein kinase C, in the brain.1 In another study, he showed that learning activates the synthesis of proteins necessary for memory formation.2 A further finding from these studies was that the brain’s multiple memory systems, once thought to operate independently, were interactive.3
Dr. Colombo describes his primary research approach in this way: introduce a behavior—such as giving an animal a memory task—and then look at what biological changes, such as alterations in genes or proteins, result in the brain.4
We met at his lovely home in New Orleans and he related a funny story about it. Built in the 1890s, it had been unoccupied by people for ten years before Dr. Colombo and his wife bought the property. The previous owner, an assistant district attorney, had left the house to her five dogs. Her will even provided money for a caretaker to look after the dogs and the house. Such a tale fits well with the unique character of this city.
Before moving into this home, Dr. Colombo and his wife, Lyle, served as faculty-in-residence on Tulane’s campus. Living there played an important role in his shift toward music neuroscience in the mid-2000s.
While on campus, Dr. Colombo met Derrick Tabb, a Grammy-award-winning drummer who believed music could help rebuild the lives of young people in New Orleans. After Hurricane Katrina, many youth initiatives—including music programs—lost funding. At the same time, many young people were struggling with the effects of drugs and poverty. In response, Tabb founded a program called The Roots of Music, which aims to engage students through music.
Dr. Colombo was drawn to Derrick’s program because he sought opportunities for Tulane students to serve as mentors and learn about the rich musical culture of New Orleans. For his part, Derrick notes, “He [Dr. Colombo] taught me about how music opens minds with kids.”5 Intrigued by the profoundly positive impact that music-based mentoring had on the children enrolled in The Roots of Music, Dr. Colombo began to collect scientific data to assess the program’s effectiveness. He has gathered years of data and intends to publish these results in his new role as Professor Emeritus.
Dr. Colombo also began to apply for research grants to study music as part of his neuroscience work. In 2020, Dr. Colombo edited a special issue on Music Training, Neural Plasticity, and Executive Function.6 That same year, he and his colleagues published a study showing that music training improves working memory.7 Their research found that music training generates brain rhythms, called neural oscillations, that play an important role in memory.8 These rhythms tend to weaken with age, but music training helps to maintain them.9 This study fits well with Dr. Colombo’s primary research approach: measuring biological changes in the brain following a behavioral intervention—in this case, music training.10
As we talked over coffee, Dr. Colombo reflected on his career. Curiously, in a city known for its music, there was and remains scant interest in New Orleans for music neuroscience. While this may reflect the city’s quirky character, Dr. Colombo hopes his work has helped lay the foundation for a future with a stronger music neuroscience presence in one of the world’s most music-oriented cities.
