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What is Chromosthesia?

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One of the rarest and most interesting variants of Synesthesia is known as Chromesthesia (aka "colored hearing"). In this unusual sensory anomaly, a person will see colors when hearing musical notes. Is the sensory defect of Chromesthesia a scientifically measurable condition and might it be a beneficial condition for musical artists to have?

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An 831 word overview of the rare Synesthesia variant called Chromesthesia, in which a person sees colors when hearing musical notes. Briefly discusses the scientific measurement of the disorder, as well as the possible positive benefits it may offer musicians and other types of artists.

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One of the strangest sensory phenomena known to modern science would have to be the condition known as Synesthesia. This condition involves the sensations of one sense, such as sight, being experienced by a second sense as well. For example, you might see a shape that is the color yellow. As you indentify the color yellow by seeing it, you might simultaneously taste a flavor your brain equates to this color as well. One of the rarest and most interesting variants of this condition is known as Chromesthesia (aka "colored hearing"). With this condition, colors are visualized as a sound is heard by the auditory senses. For instance, someone with Chromesthesia may be listening to a piece of classical music, and as they listen, they are experiencing a visual spectrum of colors as the notes are being played; in effect, they are experiencing a virtual light show in their head. While once considered a quaint idea but not an actual condition, Chromesthesia is now recognized and studied as an actual physical condition. The musical arts have shown an especially keen affinity for the study of this phenomenon.

L. B. Castel, an eighteenth century musician and inventor, once stated: "For we are born in music, and we have only to open our ears in order to taste it . . . and . . . one has only to open one's eyes in ...

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