Synesthesia’s contribution to the creative process
Kanye West. Billie Eilish. Frank Ocean. Beyoncé. What do these artists have in common?
They have the unusual ability to see colors through music. These artists have a neurological condition called synesthesia, which causes people with this condition to be able to experience one sense through another sense. An example of this may be when you hear the word “Tuesday” and taste lemon, or you hear a song and see the color purple. Synesthesia is a long-lasting condition that starts in childhood, and there are many different types. Sound-to-color synesthesia is common in many musical artists, but other types include grapheme-color synesthesia, in which letters/numbers are associated with colors, and lexical-gustatory synesthesia, in which words/sounds cause one to taste different tastes.
The condition itself has genetic origins according to research studies that have reported cases of co-occurrence of synesthesias in the same family. However, synesthetic associations are also developed through interactions with the environment. Music to color associations are usually standard among people with synesthesia, according to a case study. There is a strong role of emotion in peoples’ associations to music, which is associated with the limbic system in the brain. This system is responsible for our emotional responses, which synesthesia relies on to create these associations.
An example of a popular modern artist of our generation with this condition is Billie Eilish, who suggests that the condition is more of an asset to her than a disorder. According to her, many of the things she encounters in her life appear to her as different shapes or colors, including talk show host Jimmy Fallon, who appears to her as a vertical brown rectangle. When it comes to her creative process, her artwork and color scheme for each song all stem from her unique ability to associate her music with different shapes and colors.
Frank Ocean’s Channel Orange is another successful product of the artist’s synesthesia. This album tells a love story about Ocean’s diverse life experiences as a youth, and delves into his innermost feelings and desires as he takes his listeners through a beautiful journey of romance and heartbreak. According to Ocean, orange was the color he saw when he first fell in love, hence the color “orange” in the album name and cover.
Kanye West is yet another successful musician who has used his synesthesia for his benefit. In an interview with Ellen Degeneres, he mentioned that his connection to sound and color is what makes him able to create a painting with his music. In his album Yeezus, he makes this connection clear as he reinvents music through these songs. This was his most innovative album yet, and West admitted that his synesthesia took the reins when creating the beats and melodies behind the tracks. He mentioned, “Stepping forward with what I know about architecture, about classicism, about society, about texture, about synesthesia — the ability to see sound — and the way everything is everything and all these things combine, and then starting from scratch with Yeezus.”
There are a plethora of other musicians who have turned this condition into their strength when creating art. Although the mechanism behind synesthesia is still largely unknown, it is held at great interest by the neuroscience community. As this condition continues to be researched, synesthesia remains as one of music’s biggest inspirations to those who have it.
