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Segmenting the complex acoustic mixture that makes a typical auditory scene into relevant perceptual objects is one of the main challenges of the auditory system [1], for both human and nonhuman species. Several recent studies indicate that perceptual auditory object formation, or "streaming," may be based on neural activity within the auditory cortex and beyond [2, 3]. Here, we find that scene analysis starts much earlier in the auditory pathways. Single units were recorded from a peripheral structure of the mammalian auditory brainstem, the cochlear nucleus. Peripheral responses were similar to cortical responses and displayed all of the functional properties required for streaming, including multisecond adaptation. Behavioral streaming was also measured in human listeners. Neurometric functions derived from the peripheral responses predicted accurately behavioral streaming. This reveals that subcortical …