Articles

Music for Life

Since human societies first emerged, nearly all of them have developed the ability to create music, and, the variety of instruments and styles of music is astonishing. Most human societies simply enjoyed and performed music rather than stopping to consider its role or analyzing its importance; it was simply a given. However, when the Greeks developed an appetite for philosophy, music, along with everything else, was subjected to philosophical analysis. As a result both Plato and Socrates concluded that music was such a potentially powerful force that it should be subjected to government control! Plato, subsequently, refined his position and went on to say in The Republic, Book 1 “Clearly, the musician is wise and he who is not a musician is foolish “. While today, we would consider this an extreme position, there is now ample evidence that music is intellectually, physically and emotionally stimulating.

The beneficial impact of music on the intellectual and social development of children has been proven in a large variety of research studies from the 1960s onwards. What is most surprising about these projects is the wide variety of fields that can be beneficially affected by learning music. These include language, mathematics, general academics, creativity, emotional development, social skills and perceptual-motor skills. References to these studies can be founds at http://members.aol.com./dspondike/mused.html.

With all of these benefits associated with teaching music to youth it would be very surprising if adults could not also benefit from music and, although there has been a lot of work done in the past twenty years to prove this, the initial work was started during the 2nd World War in 1944 by the American services. The program had three components. Active participation was to aid in the social readjustment of the patient, to boost morale and to provide occupational therapy. Passive participation was to assist the patients’ social and mental readjustment. Finally, audio-receptive was for entertainment. The program was successfully implemented in about 120 veteran administration hospitals.

In the 1980s and 90s music therapy became accepted as being beneficial for asthma patients and also for those suffering from dementia and Alzheimer’s. Alicia Ann Clair at the University of Kansas conducted a variety of studies on the effects of both active and passive music participation on Alzheimer’s patients. She concludes that “Both music background and music listening have great potential to benefit those with dementia” and “active engagement in music generally has positive outcomes because it stimulates the processes and abilities that remain intact”.

With the case for music therapy already made, attention was turned to the possible role of music in the maintenance of ‘wellness’. At the forefront of this work has been Dr Ted Tims at the School of Music of Michigan State University. A recent study of healthy seniors concluded that “Participants experienced an increase in relaxation and a general sense of emotional well-being, along with a decrease in anxiety, depression, and perception of loneliness, known to suppress the human immune function”. There was also an unexpected purely physical benefit because ”the adult students had a 90% increase in levels of Human Growth Hormone (HGH)”. HGH is believed to be responsible for delaying the aging process and its associated aches and pains.

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