RESOUNDING ECHOES: From August 2022, Robert McCarney's regular series features little-known twentieth century classical composers.
Gordon L Shaw, the American scientist who became known for his research about the effects of classical music on the human mind, was born in Atlantic City, New Jersey in 1932.
He was a professor of physics at the Irvine Campus of California University.
After he retired, Shaw's study of 1993, about students whose IQ grew significantly after listening to a Mozart sonata, brought him wide acclaim. In 1998, he founded the Music Intelligence Neural Development (MIND) institute to foster research about the relationship between classical music and learning. He also wrote the book Keeping Mozart in Mind.
Gordon Shaw died in Laguna Beach on 26 April 2005, aged seventy-two, following a battle with cancer.