Does Playing an Instrument Help Your Brain as You Get Older?

     I always admired those who could play an instrument. I can remember as a kid my grandfather getting out the old accordion, or his harmonica. Sometimes we would get lucky and hear him play both at the same time! I learned how to play the piano and although I don't still play, I could pick it back up at any time. It's like riding a bike!

    Little did I know, that when I learned to play the piano, it might actually help me in my old age. Not only that, I believe playing piano helps with our Math skills. But don't quote me on that! I've always thought everyone needs to at least learn how to read music and play one instrument. I believe that now more than ever.

    But what does research say about this? There was a study done that investigated whether elderly musicians have better auditory and cognitive abilities over those who are non-musicians. The findings were that non-musicians in auditory and cognitive tasks do not have as good of a performance as musicians. There was just a slight difference. The explanation is that a better cognitive performance might be because musicians keep their brain active and continue to learn music. In doing so, this causes them to retain complex cognitive skills compared to non-musicians in their old age.

    These speculations need to be confirmed by further studies, but it sure does help us to know that continuing to stimulate our brain is a good thing. So although we are not sure if it is music or just learning in general, we should keep our brains active and continue to stimulate them and learn! During the study it was determined there was no difference in short-term memory. Darn!

    So what does all this mean for us? The suggestion is that life-long music training may be associated with enhanced cognitive and auditory performance in older age. But there needs to be further investigation. Time for me to start playing that piano again!

Grassi, M., Meneghetti, C., Toffalini, E., & Borella, E. (2017). Auditory and cognitive performance in elderly

    musicians and nonmusicians. PLoS ONE, 12(11), 1–21. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0187881


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