Do you think talent is innate, or is it something we learn and acquire overtime? Either way, talent is something to be cherished. It isn’t something we all have. Even for the people who deem themselves talented, what they’re talented in may vary from the talent that someone else possesses.
If you want to know about someone who’s immensely talented in the field of music, I’d refer you to 18-year-old Matthew Whitaker from Hackensack, New Jersey. He not only knows how to tickle the ivories, but he does it despite having been blind his entire life!
What’s more, Matthew is a survivor. Doctors gave him a 50% chance of living when he was born. 11 surgeries later, he’s thriving today. In fact, he learned to play the piano before he could even walk. And by the age of three, little Matthew was writing his own songs and playing two-hand piano compositions with no previous training.
Seeing how much he loved the piano, Matthew’s parents decided to place him in Filomen M. D’Agostino Greenberg Music School for the Visually Impaired at the age of five. He was the youngest student to ever attend. The school director, Dalia Sakas, was stunned to see how advanced of a player Matthew was. From playing complex songs to quickly memorizing new piano pieces by ear so effortlessly, the Sakas knew there was something very special about the student.
“I was performing a couple of recitals and the Dvorak Piano Quintet is a piece actually for a piano and string quartet. So there’s five of us,” Sakas said to CBS. “So Matt and his mom came to hear, you know, the night I played. He comes in Saturday morning. I walk into the studio and he’s playing the opening of the Dvorak Quintet.”
Today, Matthew’s talent has taken him great places and won him numerous awards.
He’s also recently caught the attention of Neurologist Dr. Charles Limb, who used to be a musician himself. Dr. Limb was interested in learning how Matthew was so good at the piano, especially with his condition.
So, Dr. Limb took two MRI scans. One scan was taken while Matthew was listening to music and being exposed to other stimuli. The second scan was taken while the prodigy was playing a keyboard. From the scans, the neurologist discovered that Matthew’s brain created new neurological pathways from his deactivated visual cortex. Even though Matthew is unable to see, his visual cortex was still lighting up on the MRI whenever he listened to his favorite songs.
“It seems like his brain is taking that part of the tissue that’s not being stimulated by sight and using it … to perceive music,” Limb explained in an interview with CBS. “It’s sort of borrowing that part of the brain and rewiring it to help him hear music.”
Even Matthew was surprised by the news.
“I didn’t even know that that was happening,” Matthew said.
This research shows just how plastic the brain is. Even if one area of the brain is damaged or unused, it’s able to essentially reroute itself to make up for it. Cool stuff!
Listen to Matthew “jazz out” on the piano with Musician Davell Crawford below.
