In this issue, Kato et al. use expression of immediate early genes to show that the caudomedial pallium of female Bengalese finches is particularly responsive to the phonology of male song and not to the sequence of its elements. We discuss the significance of these findings in the wider framework of birdsong in songbirds and parrots, which has become a prominent model system for the neurobiology of learning, memory and perception. Male song is an important signal in songbird sexual selection, and females show behavioural and neural preferences for particular songs or song elements. In addition, birdsong learning is increasingly seen as the closest animal equivalent to the acquisition of speech and language in humans.