Face the Music: My most humiliating story

I have an embarrassing secret: I am tone deaf. I don’t just mean that I am a terrible singer who can’t carry a tune, I mean clinically tone deaf. Or amusic, as the scientists say. I’ve been tested. Many times.

But I also love music. How is it possible for someone who is tone deaf to also be a music nerd? Well, I’ve spent a lot of time over the last few years trying to figure that out and that’s also led me to explore how we hear music. The results of my investigation so far appear in the new issue of Maisonneuve magazine in a piece called, “Face the Music.” (I say “so far” because I hope to expand the article into a book.)

The story won’t be online for a couple of months so I hope you will consider picking up a copy of Maisonneuve — you’ll be supporting a great Canadian magazine in the process.