I have synesthesia and I have had it since I was a child. If you have not heard of the word, I am not that surprised because usually the it’s the folks who have it who are most familiar with it.

Synesthesia is not a disorder, or condition. It does not hinder one’s life in any way. It is not an imagination of something. It, in fact, simply is. For those who have it, they know what I mean.

There are multiple types of synesthesia. I have what is called Grapheme Color Synesthesia, (letters and numbers are inherently colored), and what is called Chromesthesia, or Sound to Color Synesthia.

For Synesthetes, this has always been. Perhaps it happened when we were in the womb. But at some point, when our brain was being developed, the connection between one or more of the five senses are adjoined—or meshed together. There are people with taste and color synesthesia—I cannot imagine what that is like!. ^{(For the more scientific explanation see links.)}

There were many known synesthetes, including Rimsy Korsokov. This is how I found out about mine: I was playing the first page of Flight of the Bumblebee. And wondered at the fact that it gave me such a sense of an adrenaline rush, each time I played it. But for some reason, I could not make myself push past that feeling in order to learn the second page. Instead, I started to wonder about the composer.

My delve into Wikipedia led me to note that Korsokov had synesthesia. This was the first time I had heard of the word. As I read more about it, I began to realize that I was also a synesthete.

Reading about it gave me clarity on why I always felt that certain songs were certain colors. And therefore justified my reasons why I had always changed the background colors on slides for each song we sang at church, so that the background would “match the song.” Boom! It hit me! I realized that synesthesia was the reason I perceived a song or even a chord change within a song, as being a certain color. It was the reason that since my earliest memories, words were painted!. My brother, Carl’s name had been yellow for as long as I could remember. The word “Mama” was the color blue and the word “Daddy” was green. As a child, I had read and reread The Chronicles of Narnia. Somehow, the word Narnia was brown, Telmarines appeared orange and Calormen were unmistakably yellow. Having this inate perception did not distract my reading or change anything about the story. However, just recalling this gave me some clarity and awareness that synesthesia had always been part of my me.

One day after church, I took a box of crayons and drew a simple blank piano keyboard. In no particular order,I began to randomly color in the piano keys In the shade or colors that I perceived each note.. Very soon, it became evident on paper that my perception of colors of the notes resembled a rainbow as varios shades blended into others. The transition from the notes F to F sharp had mysteriously gone from deep blue to a dark purple. D minor was always green. B flat was brown. While its enharmonic color of A sharp was just a bright red. “A natural” was a truer sort of red while A flat was a cranberry color. G was brick red and so on it went. When I looked down at my keybord it looked something like this.

I recently tried to recreate this experience using Faber Castell water color pencils. However, it seemed more accurate using a box of crayons because this time, I did not have access to a true red. So there were less choices to work with.

^{Ok, this part might get weirder if you aren’t familiar with music theory but consider yourself forewarned:}

One thing that fascinated me is that major chords tend to blend with their relative minors (such as D major to B minor) similar to what you would see in a color wheel with complementary colors on the other side of the wheel. They also have variations of color in how they interact. For instance, D minor is green but when the seventh degree of the scale is added (the note B) it adds B’s color, which in my case is a kind of greenish brown color like freshly picked Lima beans. D major chord, on the other hand is a light orange color. So there is a lot of interaction between D major and B minor from oranges to greens. The same is true with the Key of C and e minor. The light blue associated with e minor and C major’s true yellow play peacefully together like water and a yellow butterfly floating over a brook. F major is Blue but it takes on a deeper more royal almost purple look when played in a song that is in the key of D minor. E flat is that muted eighties blue. If you also have synesthesia— before you get all confused by this. Remember, colors are not the same for every person who has synesthesia. Someone else might see pink and chartreuse!!

If you have synesthesia, I would love it if you would add something in the comments about what type you have, what colors you see for letters or numbers and or music. Or, if you have a different type please share. I would love to learn more about it.

We are in good company with many known composers, scientists and physicians in history. Some of our fellow synesthete composers include Billie Eilish, Billy Joel, Franz List, Itzhak Perlman, Richard Wagoner and Duke Ellington. But for a more comprehensive list please visit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_with_synesthesia

I hope you do share your thoughts and moments of realization with me. If you are like I was and just had this kind of inherent experience your whole life and you just had an epiphany about it, please let me know! ~ Laura