The Benefits of playing music-for adults and kids

                                     Benefits of playing music—for adults and kids

The Music Factory School Of Music

www.themusicfactoryoc.com

We’ve all heard there are many reasons people should learn to play music. Many say it helps with creativity, math, concentration and the list goes on. But are these just myths? 

Early this year, a new study released from Northwestern University proved that the lifelong playing of musical instruments has a positive impact on the brain. The study was published in the Chicago Tribune, and essentially shows that playing an instrument helps tune the brain. 

"A musician has to be constantly picking out sounds from others. Just as we lift weights to build our biceps, playing music makes our nervous systems more efficient,” says Nina Kraus, a neuroscientist at Northwestern and principal investigator of its Auditory Neuroscience Laboratory.

The study included 87 participants — younger (18 to 32) and older (45 to 65), musicians and nonmusicians. The musicians were not all professional, but they played their instruments at least three times a week into adulthood.

And what about the effects for kids? The same researchers found that just one to five years of experience playing music as a child was associated with an improved cognitive ability in processing complex sounds as a young adult. (source: Smithsonianmag.com)

“We help address a question on every parent’s mind: ‘Will my child benefit if she plays music for a short while but then quits training?’” says Nina Kraus, the study’s co-author. “Based on what we already know about the ways that music helps shape the brain, the study suggests that short-term music lessons may enhance lifelong listening and learning.

The study split participants up into three groups—those with no musical instruction, those with one to five years of instruction and those with six to 11 years of instruction. The results were striking. Musicians with more than six years experience showed the greatest mental response to the tones, but those with one to five years still did better than those with none.

The researchers say that this mental response indicates the ability to pull out the lowest frequency in a complex sound, and their previous work has shown this ability is crucial for both speech and music perception, especially in noisy environments. Thus, playing music for just a few years as a child seems to be linked with better listening skills much later on.

So play on, and benefit for life. 

Links:

Source link: Chicago Tribune 

(link to: http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2012-03-28/news/ct-x-music-training-study-20120328_1_musical-instruments-musical-training-musical-education

 Source: Smithsonianmag.com 

(link to: http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/science/2012/08/playing-music-as-a-child-leads-to-better-listening-as-an-adult/ )

Do I need to read music to play drums?

Do I need to read Music to play Drums?

Eric Berringer

Music Factory drum instructor

There are the age old questions "Do I need to learn how to read music in order to play drums?" "Are drum lessons right for me?" Technically, I cannot answer that because I am not you, but…. here are some of my thoughts.

Do I believe that pursuing an understanding above and beyond just copying what you hear or see can make you an outstanding musician/drummer? Absolutely!! There is obviously value in learning by ear thru songs and videos, and anyone who tells you otherwise is misleading you. In the same way, you are doing yourself a disservice by avoiding, what some consider, "complex theory and rhythms" because you or someone else may have deemed them too difficult or mundane. As a drum instructor, I do not say this out of fear of loosing students, but out of a fear of stifling creativity that has not been given the opportunity to surface. 

Creativity is the driving force behind music and is what motivates an instrumentalist in the first place. Pursuing the skills to be better at your instrument is all part of the creative process. No one can claim whether or not someones creativity is valid, that is the opposite of what musical collaboration is all about. But when we choose to ignore certain parts of what we know can make us better, we weaken our ability to be creative. 

We will not always have resources to look to when we are performing, practicing, collaborating, etc., and that is why possessing a knowledge of drumming from the bottom up is so important. Surprises happen in musical situations outside of forgetting your drum throne or your stick bag on a gig. Sometimes they come in the form of a time or feel change, volume restriction, form change, or song change, some of which could involve playing to backing tracks, reading charts, correcting charts, drastically changing your dynamics, or taking notes ALL ON THE FLY!! You may not see yourself in situations like this, but when they happen you will probably be wishing you had given them some thought.

This IS NOT to say that being "book smart" is a prerequisite for drumming or being in a band. This IS saying that if you want to reach the next level in your ability to play, write, understand, contribute, and function in a musical setting… equip yourself.