This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. These cookies ensure basic functionalities and security features of the website, anonymously. Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Now, clearly, musical skill and proficiency isn’t required to be a good crossword solver - I’d classify myself as a pretty good solver and I have an almost magical lack of musical talent - but it’s intriguing to ponder how puzzling could easily be wrapped up with a musical bow.Your email address will not be published. In an interview with the New York Times, Dan Feyer built on this idea, stating that music, math, and puzzles all have pattern recognition in common, quickly recognizing combinations of blanks and spaces and mentally filling in possible answer words, even before reading the clues.
It’s about “finding meaning in structure.” He posited a correlation between word puzzles, math, and music, in that they all involve a quick and intuitive understanding of symbols.
LACK OF MUSICALITY CROSSWORD CLUE SERIES
If you have that kind of mind, and you add it to it a wide range of information, and you can spell, you’d be a really great crossword puzzler.Ĭrossword constructor and psychology professor Arthur Schulman - known for a series of seminars entitled “The Mind of the Puzzler” at the University of Virginia - would agree with that statement. He’s taken all those notes and absorbs what they mean, instantaneously. In other words, a piano player like John Delfin, the greatest crossword player of our time, he sits down and he sees three staffs of music and he can instantly play it. Their ability to assimilate a lot of coded information instantly. In the crossword documentary Wordplay (and quoted from the article linked below), former New York Times Public Editor Daniel Okrent mentioned why he felt that musicians and mathematicians were good fits as crossword solvers: No one can say for sure, but there are theories. So what’s the connection between music and crossword puzzles? Constructor Patrick Blindauer, puzzler and actress Whitney Avalon, Lollapuzzoola co-founder Brian Cimmet, and even our own Director of Digital Games Fred Galpern are all musicians. Practically one out of every three!Īnd both of them have a musical background as pianists and music directors.īut they’re not the only ones. Fourteen out of forty-one ACPT tournaments have been won by one of these men. There are two 7-time champions in the history of the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament: Dan Feyer and Jon Delfin.