YOUR BRAIN ON DRUMS
TO A STRANGER, I’d probably look like an octopus having a fever dream—my twitchy appendages stomping the hi-hat pedal and whacking the snare when they should be doing something else. To my long-suffering drum teacher, I’m one of countless amateurs he’s guided through a legendary pop-music groove—the intro to Paul Simon’s “50 Ways to Leave Your Lover,” played by the inimitable drummer Steve Gadd. To a neurologist who studies the effects of music on the brain, I’d be another thing entirely—a middle-aged man doing the equivalent of a full-body workout for his gray matter.
That’s not hyperbole. For much of the past two decades, doctors and scientists have been gathering heaps of evidence that not only suggests but flat-out shows how playing music makes your brain function better. From UC San Francisco to Northwestern, from the University of Central Florida to Pitt and others, the findings are as consistent as our brains are complex. The simple—or maybe you’re playing—the benefits can stay with you into old age. What’s more, the physiological and psychological dividends are especially substantial if you’re a novice, or if you’re dusting off an instrument from your youth. Translation: As long as you’re challenged in some small way, being bad at an instrument is good for you.
