Lecture | Tuesday Talk
The Biological Roots of Musicality
- Date
- Tuesday 12 May 2026
- Time
- Address
-
Gorlaeus Building
Einsteinweg 55
2333 CC Leiden - Room
- CM1.26
Snowball the cockatoo became an internet sensation for his perfectly timed dance moves to the Backstreet Boys—but what does his sense of rhythm tell us about the origins of music? His performance suggests that the ability to perceive and respond to rhythm may not be uniquely human, but rooted more deeply in biology than we once thought.
Join us for this Tuesday Talk, where Assistant Professor Michelle Spierings explores how musicality emerges across the animal kingdom. By comparing primates, songbirds, and parrots, her research reveals which cognitive and vocal abilities underpin music perception, production, and appreciation.
Join this Tuesday Talk
Everyone who is interested in this edition's topic is welcome. Please let us know if you are attending.
RegisterProgramme
The programme of the Tuesday Talk is:
| 15.45 hrs | Take a seat |
| 16.00 hrs | Tuesday Talks: Science Insights |
| 17.00 hrs | Drinks |
Music Across Species
Comparative research offers a powerful way to uncover the biological foundations of musicality. By studying abilities such as music perception, production, and appreciation in different species, researchers can identify which elements of music are shared—and which are uniquely human.
Michelle’s work brings together insights from closely related primates and more distantly related but highly vocal species such as songbirds and parrots. These cross-species comparisons help to reveal how complex musical capacities may have evolved from more fundamental biological building blocks, shedding new light on the origins of music and communication.
About the speaker
Michelle Spierings is Assistant Professor at the Institute for Biology at Leiden University. Her research focuses on the biological foundations of musicality and language by comparing cognitive and vocal abilities across species. She studies how animals such as primates, songbirds, and parrots perceive, produce, and learn complex sounds, aiming to uncover which building blocks of music are shared across evolution. By combining behavioural experiments with a comparative approach, her work bridges biology, cognition, and acoustics, and contributes to our understanding of how complex communication systems evolve.
About the Tuesday Talks
The Tuesday Talks are Leiden Science’s monthly dose of research inspiration from our staff, for our staff and all others curious minds. Every second Tuesday of the month from 16:00 hrs till 17:00 hrs, drinks and meet up afterwards till 18.00 hrs.