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Pets, Babies and Beethoven by Joe Procopio
 A few years ago, I was writing a song on the piano and every time and went
to a certain spot in the song that had very high notes in it my daughter's pet
birds suddenly stated to sing wildly. This gave me the idea to rewrite some of
my songs and record them with some very high notes for pets. We all know that
animals are more sensitive to high notes than humans. In fact dogs can hear a
dog whistle but humans can't.
I first recorded my songs with the melody at a level that we normally listen
to and then went back and layered melodies and harmonies that are much higher.
I took care not to hurt pets by not going too high. I called it Pethoven (a play
on the word Beethoven). I sold several thousand copies (the first 1000 to a Dog
Training Video Company in Geneva Switzerland who used Pethoven as a tool in marketing
dog training videos).
Many people were very happy to have this special music for pets and they have
written letters to tell me so. Then David Moye, a journalist from San Diego,
wrote an article on Pethoven and this sparked new interest in pet music at an
unexpected intensity. My telephone did not stop ringing. Since then, I have done
many live radio shows playing pet music with all kinds af reactions. There has
even been an interest in pet music internationally.
Here is an example of the interest in pet music using. Several years ago,
when I did the Van and Cheryl Show live on radio in Minneapolis, Van said to
me on the phone: "Joe, we have a confession to make. We have Margaret on
the other line and she has her dog named Malcolm who is not a happy dog. We want
to test your pet music Pethoven with him." I said: "Now let me get
this straight; we have Margaret from Minneapolis with "mad dog Malcolm and
you want to see if Pethoven will have a positive effect on him?" Yes, he
said. So I played 30 seconds of Pethoven over the phone. Margaret could not believe
Malcolm's reaction...he nearly fell asleep. We all laughed very hard. Finally,
Van regained composure and said to me: "Joe, Joe, do you have anything for
Mother-in-Laws?
Now I know Van was joking because there is no way that I know of nor are there
any clinical tests that I am aware of that test if animals can respond in a certain
or predicable way to any kind of music. Certainly there is no way to determine
if they like or enjoy music in the same way that humans do. We are different
in our nature as beings.
What do I mean by that? Animals and humans have many things in common but
there is one critical difference. Animals do not have a mind. I do not mean brain.
We both have brains. A brain is an organ (a material thing located in the head).
But a mind is an immaterial power. It can understand. It can abstract.
A dog can recognize a ball but it cannot know or understand roundness or circularity.
It takes a mind to know universals.
Let us say you can play the clarinet. Then one day you have a accident and
your clarinet is badly damaged. Because your clarinet is broken, you cannot play
it but you have not lost the power to play it - the immaterial power of the mind
to do so.
In the same way, if your brain, which is a material organ, is badly damaged you
cannot play the clarinet but you have not lost the power to do so.
If you put your hand in a fire and a dog puts its paw in the same fire both
of you will withdraw - because of the heat. But the dog cannot ask the question:
Why fire? The dog can sense the heat just as you can but it cannot ask the universal
question: What is fire? That is why we have furnaces and engines, and rockets,
and all the inventions of civilization etc. but dogs and cats have nothing to
warm them except the love and care of their owners- much like a human baby
In addition, animals have better senses than humans. They can see and smell
better. They can learn better. But they cannot understand. Learning is not the
same as understanding.
If I put you in a maze with a million dollars at the end of it and a rat in
a similar maze with some cheese at the end of it, the rat will be at the end
of the maze eating the cheese before you even get out of the blocks. Animals
learn faster and better.
Even so, if I put you and a cat in jail and starved you both for three days,
I guarantee you that when I release you both on the fourth day and offer you
some food the cat will eat. But I wouldnt bet a nickel on you. You may just be
angry enough at me to put off eating for a little while longer not to give me
the satisfaction of ruling your life.
In the end, then, pets that are gentle are like babies. Permanent babies.
They are very much like babies that never grow up. Since babies are humans that
do not have a mind that has developed yet, pets, without a mind as part of their
nature, are just like babies.
After all is said and done, trying to evaluate the reaction ot a pet to music
is very much like trying to evaluate the reaction of a baby to music. In my opinion,
playing Beethoven to a baby is much the same as playing Beethoven to a pet.
As I said earlier, animals are more sensitive to high notes than humans. To
be specific, animals such as dogs and cats can hear sound frequencies as high
as 30,000 vibrations per second while humans are limited to about 15,000 to 18,000
vibrations per second. That is why I said that a dog can hear a dog whistle with
vibrations much higher than 18,000 but a human being cannot.
When I first developed this special music with these very high frequencies
I was interviewed by a journalist named Walt Shotwell who wrote a feature article
in The Des Moines Register (March 20,1990). He was fascinated by my music - music
for pets. He asked the question: But if humans cant hear the animal range how
does a pet owner know the pet is listening, or that there is really a second
level of sound on the tape, for that matter? ( This was so long ago that people
still used cassette tapes)I answered simply saying that one can make a judgment
by the way the animals react.
My own personal judgments are based on actual experiences in life i.e. my
cousins dog howls along with the music, my daughters pet birds begin singing,
and countless numbers of people have written to me to tell me wonderful stories
of how their pets react. All different. All fun. Much like humans. A lot like
babies.
One fellow wrote to me with the story about his having to drive once a year
from California to New York. He always took his two cats with him. They were
always trouble. The long drive made them fidgety and restless. Then he tried
my pet music and said driving coast to coast with his cats was much more calm
and pleasant. I love hearing stories like that.
Walt Shotwell enjoyed the stories too but was still wanting a more scientific
answer. So he went to the University of Iowa and asked Dr. Robert Carithers who,
at the time, was a veterinary neurologist and professor of veterinary medicine
at the State University.
Dr, Carithers was skeptical of my claims but he did not dismiss them entirely.
He agreed that dogs can hear up to about 30,000 hertz compared to only 18,000
hertz for a human in the prime of life; but Dr, Carithers was unaware of any
research that shows animals to be more sensitive to sounds above human range.
Some people play the piano and their dog will howl Carithers said. I know
of one dog that howls when it hears an harmonica. Then, when Walt continued to
press Dr. Carithers for an evaluation of my claims, that is when the good doctor
claimed: I am not going to call him a liar.
As a professor of music who has taught at the college level and in public
schools for years, I occasionally found that dogs will react to some of the worlds
most beautiful music with more emotion than some students. I could play Beethoven
or Pethoven for them and they would have no response at all. But Fido always
seemed to love both.
All in all, the point from my perspective is that pets will react to music
pretty much the same way humans do. Some will love it. Other will hate it. Some
will remain indifferent. Just like babies.
Joe Procopio ASCAP
President,
Procopio Music
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