Daniel J. Levitin is an award-winning neuroscientist, musician, and best-selling author. His research encompasses music, the brain, health, productivity, and creativity.
Levitin has published more than 300 articles, in journals including Science, Nature, PNAS, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, and The Wall Street Journal. His research has been featured over 1900 times in the popular press.
He is the author of four New York Times bestselling books: This Is Your Brain On Music, The World in Six Songs, The Organized Mind, and Successful Aging, as well as the international bestseller A Field Guide to Lies. A popular public speaker, he has given presentations on the floor of Parliament in London, to the U.S. Congress, Microsoft, Google, and Amazon. He has consulted for a number of companies including Apple, Booz-Allen, Microsoft, the United States Navy, Sonos, Philips, Sony, Fender, and AT&T.
Dr. Levitin earned his B.A. from Stanford in Cognitive Science, his M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology with a Ph.D. minor in Music Technology from the University of Oregon, and completed post-doctoral training at Stanford University Medical School and UC Berkeley in Neuroimaging and Perception.
As a musician (tenor saxophone, guitar, vocals, and bass), he has performed with Mel Tormé, David Byrne, Rosanne Cash, Sting, Bobby McFerrin, Victor Wooten, and Tom Scott. Levitin has produced and consulted on albums by artists including Stevie Wonder, Steely Dan, Joni Mitchell and on the films Good Will Hunting and Pulp Fiction, and has been awarded 17 gold and platinum records.
Levitin is currently the Founding Dean of Arts & Humanities at the Minerva Schools at the Keck Graduate Institute, San Francisco, California, and James McGill Professor Emeritus of Psychology, Neuroscience, and Music at McGill University.