What do you think?
Rate this book
The Conscious Ear: My Life of Transformation through Listening
Book by Alfred A. Tomatis
306 pages, Paperback
First published February 1, 1992
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
April 4, 2026
THE DEVELOPER OF A FORM OF MUSICAL HEALING TELLS HIS STORY
Alfred A. Tomatis (1920-2001) was a French medical doctor, best-known for his Alternative Medicine theories of hearing and listening known as the ‘Tomatis Method’ (sometimes inaccurately called ‘The Mozart Effect’).
The Foreword to this 1977 book by Marilyn Ferguson [author of ‘The Aquarian Conspiracy’ and other books) states, “Eventually, [Tomatis] found that he could restore singers’ voices by means of an ‘electronic ear,’ which filtered for certain frequencies.” (Pg. xii)
The Preface by Don Campbell (who DID write the book, ‘The Mozart Effect: Tapping the Power of Music to Heal the Body, Strengthen the Body’) states, “When I first read his autobiography … I was stunned by all the associations and connections it made with music, learning, and language development… In the last 40 years, Dr. Tomatis’ first basic theory has been tested with over a million clients worldwide: ‘The voice contains only what the ear hears.’ In other words, the larynx emits only the harmonics that the ear can hear. To the musician and music teacher this ignites a genuine curiosity about the very laborious ‘ear training’ methods used in music classrooms and studios. To speech therapists, reading specialists, and psychologists this basic theory has dozens of other important implications… Through his very specific Method of using filtered and unfiltered sounds of Mozart, Gregorian Chant, and the mother’s voice, to learning how to sing ‘through the bones,’ Dr. Tomatis challenges every ear to listen with grater facility.” (Pg. xiii-xiv)
Tomatis explains, “like most emotional people, I am a born observer. I am most happy when watching and analyzing what is going on around me. This outlook has been of enormous help to me both in research and in the clinic. It fits in with my temperament, but it is also the result of the fact that I have been more often in the company of adults than of boys my own age. As a child, I got along much better with adults… I could observe them and listen to them at my leisure. When I was with my contemporaries, my reserve was inevitably taken as scorn… I was not just a little timid. My timidity was outrageous, colossal, monstrous. My relationships with others were troubled by this, deeply and durably.” (Pg. 15-16)
He reports, “By seeing and hearing [his whole family] year after year… Little by little I understood… the fundamental position that these women occupied… This was the matriarchy… Behind a tradition of obedience [to men], which was a mere facade, they fulfilled their fundamental vocation of ‘governing’… the men… it was the women who … were the central pillar of family activities… the attitude of the men… was only what the women wanted it to be… The truth which came to light from this revelation showed that the husband is never anything but his wife’s eldest child… I shall never forget this precious lesson.” (Pg. 24-25)
He states, “To listen to someone else singing is to enter into a partnership of vibration… The listener who is situated within this air space is going to find himself ‘sculpted’ by the vibrations… this theory throws light on many phenomena. If listening to a good singer gives us a feeling of well-being, it is because he communicates to us his own posture. Our countenance expands, and we begin to breathe deeply. In contrast, we easily become aggressive in the presence of a bad singer; we suffer with him, we tighten the larynx, and we strain, just as he himself is doing.” (Pg. 47)
He asserts, “We have two ears, but each fulfills a different function. The chief function of the right ear is to be a ‘director.’ … The right ear takes charge of operations because it receives information more rapidly. This is an absolute: all great singers and musicians are ‘right-eared.’ … the dominant ear focuses on a precise sound, while the other is content to provide a general picture of the sonic background.” (Pg. 50-52)
He observes, “The interplay of reactions, after the body has been set in motion by the voice, brings about the control of the voice by the body. In the art of singing, it is the entire being that is involved.” (Pg. 55)
Of his development of the ‘Electronic Ear,’ he recalls, “the first machine caused much dismay in the slumbering little world of singing teachers and speech therapists. Alarmed, the leading practitioners rushed to my room and contemplated with the liveliest repulsion a machine which, they thought, was going to snatch the very bread from their mouths… which did not prevent them from building machines themselves which some years later bore a strange resemblance to mine!” (Pg. 57)
He recounts how “a member of the Rockefeller Foundation suggested to me that I abandon all my research projects in France to work in a laboratory at Georgetown University in the United States…. ‘Listen to me,’ I objected. ‘You forget something which for me is essential. I am not merely a laboratory worker. I am also a therapist. I don’t want to turn my back on medicine.’” (Pg. 121)
Of his therapeutic work with children, he reports, “This new phase begins with listening through the Electronic Ear to phonemes rich in high frequencies, which we call ‘filtered sibilants.’ … Alternated with sessions of filtered sibilants are sessions of filtered music, which relax tensions. The sound bath in which we plunge the child washes away his anxieties… When the problem is to replace the absent mother, Mozart’s music is most appropriate. Why Mozart and why not Beethoven… or Louis Armstrong? Perhaps it is [Mozart’s] precocity that provides the answer. He began to compose excellent works at the age 4½ … Even before his birth, Mozart was saturated with music… Even while still in his mother’s womb, he created neuronic musical ‘engrams’ and adjusted his listening postures accordingly… the diffusion of Mozart’s works through the Electronic Ear provides a desirable architecture for the neural foundations of listening… and so of the individual’s relationship with the surrounding world.” (Pg. 159-160)
He states, “Thirty years ago when I spoke of audio-phonology, many people laughed derisively… I notice that it is now an accepted idea and sometimes even taught at a university. Some of its chief proponents now come from the ranks of those who sneered at me in the past, which does not stop them from continuing to treat me as a charlatan. For many of them the vital element in the term ‘audio-phonology’ is the hyphen which they employ as a symbol of separation!” (Pg. 173)
He asserts, “My work has been much plagiarized, much plundered, but I harbor no bitterness as a result. I will even go so far as to say that if the counterfeits of the machines I perfected were able to help more clients, I should be the first to commend them. What troubles and grieves me is that the majority of forgers are not content with exploiting someone else’s ideas. They want the world to bear witness to their own genius…” (Pg. 180-181)
After a medical emergency that he recovered from, he comments, “I have a deep seated conviction that I was granted the grace to encounter the pangs of death so that I could have experience while still alive of that descent into the abyss which has been so often described. Beyond that, it gave me tangible confirmation of what has always been my deep faith, to know that we never die. Death does not exist… The result is that the complex journey of life appears like the series of acts which most people traverse without understanding… Only a few succeed in making the different stages of life’s dynamic process objective enough to decipher them, in going beyond existence to discover the source of Being." (Pg. 196-197)
He says, “The human ear in its quest for listening prepares its kingdom from the very first days of conception. It is the first in every respect to show life in its dynamic of communication and communion. It prepares its whole neuronic network in order to record and memorize to maximum effect the fetal experiences that will be the very basis of the human pathway upon which the child will tread after its birth.” (Pg. 213)
This book will be of great interest those interested in Tomatis’ work.
Alfred A. Tomatis (1920-2001) was a French medical doctor, best-known for his Alternative Medicine theories of hearing and listening known as the ‘Tomatis Method’ (sometimes inaccurately called ‘The Mozart Effect’).
The Foreword to this 1977 book by Marilyn Ferguson [author of ‘The Aquarian Conspiracy’ and other books) states, “Eventually, [Tomatis] found that he could restore singers’ voices by means of an ‘electronic ear,’ which filtered for certain frequencies.” (Pg. xii)
The Preface by Don Campbell (who DID write the book, ‘The Mozart Effect: Tapping the Power of Music to Heal the Body, Strengthen the Body’) states, “When I first read his autobiography … I was stunned by all the associations and connections it made with music, learning, and language development… In the last 40 years, Dr. Tomatis’ first basic theory has been tested with over a million clients worldwide: ‘The voice contains only what the ear hears.’ In other words, the larynx emits only the harmonics that the ear can hear. To the musician and music teacher this ignites a genuine curiosity about the very laborious ‘ear training’ methods used in music classrooms and studios. To speech therapists, reading specialists, and psychologists this basic theory has dozens of other important implications… Through his very specific Method of using filtered and unfiltered sounds of Mozart, Gregorian Chant, and the mother’s voice, to learning how to sing ‘through the bones,’ Dr. Tomatis challenges every ear to listen with grater facility.” (Pg. xiii-xiv)
Tomatis explains, “like most emotional people, I am a born observer. I am most happy when watching and analyzing what is going on around me. This outlook has been of enormous help to me both in research and in the clinic. It fits in with my temperament, but it is also the result of the fact that I have been more often in the company of adults than of boys my own age. As a child, I got along much better with adults… I could observe them and listen to them at my leisure. When I was with my contemporaries, my reserve was inevitably taken as scorn… I was not just a little timid. My timidity was outrageous, colossal, monstrous. My relationships with others were troubled by this, deeply and durably.” (Pg. 15-16)
He reports, “By seeing and hearing [his whole family] year after year… Little by little I understood… the fundamental position that these women occupied… This was the matriarchy… Behind a tradition of obedience [to men], which was a mere facade, they fulfilled their fundamental vocation of ‘governing’… the men… it was the women who … were the central pillar of family activities… the attitude of the men… was only what the women wanted it to be… The truth which came to light from this revelation showed that the husband is never anything but his wife’s eldest child… I shall never forget this precious lesson.” (Pg. 24-25)
He states, “To listen to someone else singing is to enter into a partnership of vibration… The listener who is situated within this air space is going to find himself ‘sculpted’ by the vibrations… this theory throws light on many phenomena. If listening to a good singer gives us a feeling of well-being, it is because he communicates to us his own posture. Our countenance expands, and we begin to breathe deeply. In contrast, we easily become aggressive in the presence of a bad singer; we suffer with him, we tighten the larynx, and we strain, just as he himself is doing.” (Pg. 47)
He asserts, “We have two ears, but each fulfills a different function. The chief function of the right ear is to be a ‘director.’ … The right ear takes charge of operations because it receives information more rapidly. This is an absolute: all great singers and musicians are ‘right-eared.’ … the dominant ear focuses on a precise sound, while the other is content to provide a general picture of the sonic background.” (Pg. 50-52)
He observes, “The interplay of reactions, after the body has been set in motion by the voice, brings about the control of the voice by the body. In the art of singing, it is the entire being that is involved.” (Pg. 55)
Of his development of the ‘Electronic Ear,’ he recalls, “the first machine caused much dismay in the slumbering little world of singing teachers and speech therapists. Alarmed, the leading practitioners rushed to my room and contemplated with the liveliest repulsion a machine which, they thought, was going to snatch the very bread from their mouths… which did not prevent them from building machines themselves which some years later bore a strange resemblance to mine!” (Pg. 57)
He recounts how “a member of the Rockefeller Foundation suggested to me that I abandon all my research projects in France to work in a laboratory at Georgetown University in the United States…. ‘Listen to me,’ I objected. ‘You forget something which for me is essential. I am not merely a laboratory worker. I am also a therapist. I don’t want to turn my back on medicine.’” (Pg. 121)
Of his therapeutic work with children, he reports, “This new phase begins with listening through the Electronic Ear to phonemes rich in high frequencies, which we call ‘filtered sibilants.’ … Alternated with sessions of filtered sibilants are sessions of filtered music, which relax tensions. The sound bath in which we plunge the child washes away his anxieties… When the problem is to replace the absent mother, Mozart’s music is most appropriate. Why Mozart and why not Beethoven… or Louis Armstrong? Perhaps it is [Mozart’s] precocity that provides the answer. He began to compose excellent works at the age 4½ … Even before his birth, Mozart was saturated with music… Even while still in his mother’s womb, he created neuronic musical ‘engrams’ and adjusted his listening postures accordingly… the diffusion of Mozart’s works through the Electronic Ear provides a desirable architecture for the neural foundations of listening… and so of the individual’s relationship with the surrounding world.” (Pg. 159-160)
He states, “Thirty years ago when I spoke of audio-phonology, many people laughed derisively… I notice that it is now an accepted idea and sometimes even taught at a university. Some of its chief proponents now come from the ranks of those who sneered at me in the past, which does not stop them from continuing to treat me as a charlatan. For many of them the vital element in the term ‘audio-phonology’ is the hyphen which they employ as a symbol of separation!” (Pg. 173)
He asserts, “My work has been much plagiarized, much plundered, but I harbor no bitterness as a result. I will even go so far as to say that if the counterfeits of the machines I perfected were able to help more clients, I should be the first to commend them. What troubles and grieves me is that the majority of forgers are not content with exploiting someone else’s ideas. They want the world to bear witness to their own genius…” (Pg. 180-181)
After a medical emergency that he recovered from, he comments, “I have a deep seated conviction that I was granted the grace to encounter the pangs of death so that I could have experience while still alive of that descent into the abyss which has been so often described. Beyond that, it gave me tangible confirmation of what has always been my deep faith, to know that we never die. Death does not exist… The result is that the complex journey of life appears like the series of acts which most people traverse without understanding… Only a few succeed in making the different stages of life’s dynamic process objective enough to decipher them, in going beyond existence to discover the source of Being." (Pg. 196-197)
He says, “The human ear in its quest for listening prepares its kingdom from the very first days of conception. It is the first in every respect to show life in its dynamic of communication and communion. It prepares its whole neuronic network in order to record and memorize to maximum effect the fetal experiences that will be the very basis of the human pathway upon which the child will tread after its birth.” (Pg. 213)
This book will be of great interest those interested in Tomatis’ work.
January 28, 2019
Amazing, breath-taking, therapeutic, inspirational!
Read
August 30, 2021Some of the medical stuff is a little too alternative or outdated for my liking and there was some really weird stuff about autism and being pro-life that i’m not at all keen on but tomatis nonetheless had some interesting and valuable work/theories and reading about them with a critical eye was interesting.
March 11, 2012
This is a kind of autobiography of how Alfred Tomatis developed his special approach to helping people suffering from tinnitus, dyslexia, stuttering etc.. It shows amazing insight into the role of hearing during the evolution and pre-natal hearing experiences.
October 24, 2007
Tomatis' ground-breaking work should be essential reading. Amazing!
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews