Alfred Tomatis, MD, a celebrated French physician, has spent five decades studying the healing and creative powers of sound and music, the Mozart Effect in particular. Many of his patients call him Dr Mozart. Tomatis has tested more than 100,000 clients in his listening centres throughout the world for listening disabilities and vocal and auditory handicaps, as well as learning disorders.
One of his better-known patients was Gerard Depardieu, the French actor. Many moviegoers have heard Depardieu speak with a mellifluous voice, but in the mid-1960s, he was a tongue-tied young man still struggling to become an actor.
Coming from a background of family difficulties, educational failures, and personal sorrows, Depardieu could not express himself. In fact, he could hardly speak coherently. And the more he tried, the worse his stammering became.
A drama teacher directed him to the Tomatis Centre in Paris, where he met with Tomatis himself. Tomatis diagnosed the cause of Depardieu’s voice and memory difficulties as deeper emotional problems underlying his physiological difficulties and said that he could help him.
Depardieu asked what the treatment would involve – surgery, medication, or speech therapy. Tomatis responded, “For the next several weeks, I want you to come here every day for two hours and listen to Mozart.”
“Mozart?” Depardieu asked, puzzled.
“Mozart,” Tomatis repeated.
The next day Depardieu returned to the Tomatis Centre to don headphones and listen to Mozart. After only a few sessions, he began to experience positive changes in his daily routine. His appetite improved, he slept better, and he found himself with more energy.
Soon, he was speaking more clearly. After several months, Depardieu returned to acting school with new poise and confidence, and went on to become one of the consummate actors of his generation.
“Before Tomatis,” Depardieu says, looking back, “I could not complete any of my sentences. He helped give continuity to my thoughts, and he gave me the power to synthesise and understand what I was thinking.”
Tomatis found again and again that regardless of a listener’s tastes or previous exposure to the composer, the music of Mozart invariably calmed listeners, improved spatial perception, and allowed them to express themselves more clearly. He found that Mozart indisputably achieved the best results, long term, whether in Tokyo, Cape Town, or Amazonia.