Emotion-related areas of the brain, such as the medial frontal cortices, amygdala, andstriatum, are activated during listening to sad or happy music as well as during listeningto pleasurable music. Indeed, in music, like in other arts, sad and happy emotionsmight co-exist and be distinct from emotions of pleasure or enjoyment. Here we aimedat discerning the neural correlates of sadness or happiness in music as opposedthose related to musical enjoyment. We further investigated whether musical expertisemodulates the neural activity during affective listening of music. To these aims, 13musicians and 16 non-musicians brought to the lab their most liked and disliked musicalpieces with a happy and sad connotation. Based on a listening test, we selected the mostrepresentative 18 sec excerpts of the emotions of interest for each individual participant.Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) recordings were obtained while subjectslistened to and rated the excerpts. The cortico-thalamo-striatal reward circuit and motorareas were more active during liked than disliked music, whereas only the auditory cortexand the right amygdala were more active for disliked over liked music. These resultsdiscern the brain structures responsible for the perception of sad and happy emotionsin music from those related to musical enjoyment. We also obtained novel evidence forfunctional differences in the limbic system associated with musical expertise, by showingenhanced liking-related activity in fronto-insular and cingulate areas in musicians.
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