William Benzon is a cognitive scientist and jazz trumpeter. His
book, Beethoven's Anvil: Music in Mind and Culture, is a great
introduction to the psychology of music. The sources are well-
researched, and Benzon makes clear distinctions between
speculative theory and observed facts. This is particularly
important, given his bias towards Evolutionary Psychology. Part
of the book is an effort to determine why humans evolved to
"musick" – Benzon's general term for all activities involving
music: listening, performing, composing, dancing, etc. – with
several theories presented and tied to observed phenomenon from
anthropology, brain scans, and linguistics. But even if you
think EP is a load of bunk, the preliminary steps Benzon makes
are interesting in their own right. He discusses the triune and
split-brain models of the mind, Manfred Clynes' Sentics, rhythm
perception, melody perception, auditory streaming, and the
creative process. Benzon has a very interesting thesis that
"music is a medium through which indi