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A Well-Tempered Mind:
Winston-Salem Conductor Peter Perret Shares the Effect of Music on Local Students
OnUNC-TV's North Carolina Bookwatch, Sunday, August 7, at 5 PM

Does music physically change the brain? Can music help kids with short attention spans, dyslexia, and other learning difficulties? Does music influence the cognitive abilities needed for reading and math?

The book A Well-Tempered Mind: Using Music to Help Children Listen and Learn asks these questions as it documents the acclaimed music and education program developed a decade ago by Winston-Salem Symphony conductor and music director Peter Perret.

In the upcoming episode of UNC-TV's local literary series, North Carolina Bookwatch, Sunday, August 7, at 5 PM, new author Peter Perret shares with host DG Martin, how he, alongside arts and education writer Janet Fox, captured the charming story of this inspirational local program.

Perret's music program was formed when five musicians from Perret's woodwind quintet walked into a first-grade classroom in Winston-Salem, NC, instruments in tow and without a word, began playing, to enthusiastic response from the children. The musicians taught the children to listen to music, detect the roles of the instruments, discern how music is constructed, and even compose their own music.

The effects of the quintet's intervention reached beyond the music classes and carried into other academic subjects as well, resulting in a significant improvement in the children's scores on annual state tests. A Well-Tempered Mind describes how the children and musicians worked together, and explores the brain research that seeks to understand how music engages the brains cognitive capabilities ranging from memory and language and emotional processing.

Perret's program-with the aim to improve the general academic performance of at-risk, economically disadvantaged children in a Winston-Salem public elementary school-has ultimately provided a local mechanism to use music as a means to learn. 

Peter Perret, Music Director and Conductor of the Winston-Salem Symphony from 1978-2004, currently teaches a graduate level neuroscience and music course at Wake Forest University. Perret is a frequent guest lecturer at conferences dealing with music and the brain.

Don't miss DG Martin's thought-provoking interview with Peter Perret on North Carolina Bookwatch, Sunday, August 7, at 5 PM, only on UNC-TV!

During this season of North Carolina Bookwatch, guests also include: Shannon Ravenel (New Stories from the South, 2005), Emily Herring Wilson (No One Gardens Alone), Randall Kenan (Walking On Water), Ann B. Ross (Miss Julia's School Of Beauty), Lawrence Earley (Looking for Longleaf), Timothy Tyson (Blood Done Sign My Name), Moreton Neal (Remembering Bill Neal: Favorite Recipes from A Life in Cooking), Quinn Dalton (Bulletproof Girl), Henry Petroski (Pushing the Limits: New Adventures in Engineering), Bill Morris (Saltwater Cowboys), Amy Tiemann (Mojo Mom), Robert F. Irwin (Robert F. Irwin 40 Years), Tommy Hays (The Pleasure Was Mine), Mary Kay Andrews (Hissy Fit), Jerry Shinn (Loonis! Celebrating a Lyrical Life), Michael Parker (If You Want Me to Stay), Lawrence Naumoff (A Southern Tragedy, in Crimson and Yellow), Martha Witt (Broken As Things Are) and Gerhard Weinberg (Visions of Victory: The Hopes of Eight World War II Leader).

Funding for North Carolina Bookwatch is provided by UNC-TV members and by Quail Ridge Books and Music, Raleigh's independent, full service bookstore, bringing readers and writers together since 1984.

North Carolina Bookwatch is part of UNC-TV's ongoing commitment to produce programs for and about North Carolina. UNC-TV is the statewide 11-station broadcast network of the University of North Carolina. For more information, please visit www.unctv.org/ncbookwatch.

For more information about North Carolina Bookwatch and UNC-TV's other local productions, please visit our website at www.unctv.org.

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