I was looking for a book with a music theme for a monthly challenge and this was the first that came to mind so I skipped a couple of books ahead in the Little Black Classics series to this entry by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, although I think his father wrote at least half of it.

Some letters are more musical than others, but this aside this edition was a bit of a mixed bag. On the one end there are the quite boring passages where Mozart and his father quarrel over the expenses of a trip, which is nothing more or less than that and which doesn't make the most thrilling of reads. On the other hand I was quite moved, when his mother falls sick when travelling with Mozart to Paris, and he can only communicate with his father and sisters through letters which take more than a week to arrive. It makes you realise just how spoiled we are nowadays to have instant communication to any place on the globe.

Little Black Classic #51

Tasks for Saint Lucia's Day: Get your Hygge on -- light a few candles if you’ve got them, pour yourself a glass of wine or hot chocolate/toddy, roast a marshmallow or toast a crumpet, and take a picture of your cosiest reading place.

 

The cat and I made a lovely comfortable evening of it last night:

 

("And what is so interesting about a cat eating his dinner, I'd like to know?!")

Wonderfully done. Short, simple, and to the point about one of the most talented and brilliant people in the world.

Book: Mozart's Last Aria

 

Author: Matt Rees

 

Genre: Historical Fiction/Mystery

 

Summary: The news arrives in a letter to his sister, Nannerl, in December 1791. But the message carries more than word of Nannerl's brother's demise. Two months earlier, Mozart confided to his wife that his life was rapidly drawing to a close . . . and that he knew he had been poisoned. In Vienna to pay her final respects, Nannerl soon finds herself ensnared in a web of suspicion and intrigue - as the actions of jealous lovers, sinister creditors, rival composers, and Mozart's Masonic brothers suggest that dark secrets hastened the genius to his grave. As Nannerl digs deeper into the mystery surrounding her brother's passing, Mozart's black fate threatens to overtake her as well. Transporting readers to the salons and concert halls of eighteenth-century Austria, Mozart's Last Aria is a magnificent historical mystery that pulls back the curtain on a world of soaring music, burning passion, and powerful secrets. -Harper Perennial, 2011.

 

Q:
As pointed out by Nobel Prize–winning neuroscientist Gerald Edelman, more than 32 million years would be required to count all of the synapses in the human brain at a counting rate of one synapse per second. And if we concentrate on the number of possible neuronal connections (circuits) within the brain, we get an even more astounding number: 10 followed by a million zeros. To put that number into some kind of perspective, consider that the number of particles in the known universe comes to only 10 followed by seventy-nine zeros. Finally, consider that the glia, which exceed the number of neurons by at least a power of 10, are also believed to be capable of communication. If this is true, then the number of possible brain states exceeds even our most extravagant projections.
(c)
I feel there must be actually something wrong with the maths either of the brain cells connections or the number of the paricles in the known universe. I strongly doubt that neuronal connections in just one brain that should each take at least one particle to create will exceed in number the quantity of particles in the part of universe that includes the said brain with all its particles. And that is even not counting the other brains that are also located elsewhere within the universe.
Or are the neuronal connections consiedered to be 10^1,000,000-10^79 times smaller than elementary particles?

Q:
You can preselect the kind of brain you will have by choosing richly varied experiences. The process starts in childhood and continues until the day you die. Incidentally, this insight—that the brain retains its plasticity across the entire life span—is a comparatively recent one. When I wrote my first book on the human brain in 1979, I didn’t hear much from the scientists I interviewed about the plasticity of the mature, adult brain. At that time, most people—scientists included—believed that as the brain matured and formed its nerve cell connections, those connections stayed in place until finally dropping out in old age. Few people thought of the brain as being susceptible to change in its actual structure.
Now, thanks to research like the experiments mentioned above, we know that the brain is much more malleable and subject to change. Indeed, we have no choice about whether or not our brain will change from the way it is today. The real question is: Will we help bring about positive, enriching changes in our brain’s structure and function, or will we allow it to undergo “disuse atrophy”?
It’s important to remember that our brain holds the key to everything we will ever accomplish. Indeed, the brain is the gateway for all of our sensations and the weaver of all of our experiences. And while most of us are convinced that exercise increases our physical well-being, it’s less commonly appreciated that the brain also must be exercised; it’s a dynamic structure that improves with use and challenge. I became convinced of this while researching two previous books on longevity. Simply put, an otherwise healthy older person can reduce his or her risk for developing dementia (formerly referred to as senility) by remaining mentally active. But the benefits of an active, challenged brain aren’t limited to late in life. Rather, the “use it or lose it” formula applies to each of us no matter what our age.
It’s important to remember that our brain holds the key to everything we will ever accomplish. Indeed, the brain is the gateway for all of our sensations and the weaver of all of our experiences. And while most of us are convinced that exercise increases our physical well-being, it’s less commonly appreciated that the brain also must be exercised; it’s a dynamic structure that improves with use and challenge. I became convinced of this while researching two previous books on longevity. Simply put, an otherwise healthy older person can reduce his or her risk for developing dementia (formerly referred to as senility) by remaining mentally active. But the benefits of an active, challenged brain aren’t limited to late in life. Rather, the “use it or lose it” formula applies to each of us no matter what our age.
Moreover, the healthy exercise of our brain’s inherent powers is highly pleasurable. Think back to occasions when you scored well on a test or prevailed in a debate or found yourself unable to put down a certain book because of the excitement you experienced while reading it. Your pleasure in each of these instances came from the exercise of your brain’s cognitive powers. Further, there are specific steps you can take to increase and strengthen these powers. In essence, you can achieve more of the things that you desire by enhancing your brain’s cognitive functioning.
(c)