for your brain

Music instructor Tyler Cavanagh teaches the
Pre-Music and Me course at LCA for ages 6-weeks to walking.

Today I read an article that once again proved to me that the arts should not be considered extra-curricular. With all the evidence and research out there on why the arts should be worth our time, here is one more to add to the list: according to "a just-published study, senior citizens who took four to 14 years of music training early in life performed better than non-musicians on a specific brain function that is vital for interpersonal communication..." Basically, music lessons as a child improve brain function as an elderly person. Those piano lessons you took? Or that squeaky violin you reluctantly played? That can mean the difference between having to ask your grandkids to talk slower or being able to keep up with conversation just fine.

Now I'm even more thankful for those four years of piano I took in elementary school.

Here's the brief article summarizing the findings which were recently published in the Journal of Neuroscience.