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| Name | Paola Rios |
| About Me | These are the great benefits of playing a musical instrument as a child The benefits of listening to music in Music School in Berlin are numerous. The brain releases dopamine -a neurotransmitter associated with pleasure- not only when a person listens to music that is pleasing to him or her, but even when he or she knows that he or she will listen to it in the near future. In addition, exposure to music contributes to lowering anxiety and improves heart rate and mood, among other benefits. As a result, music is increasingly used as a therapeutic tool. But if listening to music has positive effects, making music – that is, playing an instrument – has even more. When someone plays an instrument, he or she is not only listening to music, but also puts his or her mind and body into action, so that this practice becomes a training in multiple senses. In particular, at the cerebral level. As illustrated by neuromusical educator Anita Collins in a TED video, “every time a musician plays an instrument, fireworks are set off in his or her brain”. Fireworks in the brain With the practice of music, the parts of the brain that work the most are the visual, auditory and motor cortexes. There is increased volume and activity in the corpus callosum, the bundle of nerve fibers linking the right and left hemispheres, since playing an instrument enhances the development and health of both. All this is even more noticeable when those who make music are children. One study concluded that children between the ages of four and six who had taken a year of music lessons had more advanced brain development and memory than other children their age who had not taken music lessons. What was most surprising to the authors was that this enhanced development not only benefited the children musically, but also in skills such as literacy, verbal memory, mathematics, visuospatial processing (the ability to represent, analyze and manipulate objects mentally) and IQ. |
