The first half of the book is dedicated to cognitive aspects of acoustic signalization: of learned bird song, of automatic mammal calls, and of speech and music in humans. The second part of the books deals with the culture of music in European modernity.
The question of the relation of music and imagination is also addressed. The book posits that music makes it easier for us to depart from paramount reality and become creative – not bad for something that started as a spandrel of speech.
