Why is Classical Music Good for the Brain? Music is an important part of keeping the mind in balance, and it may be one of the best ways to heal our stressed-out brains and minds. But before we look at mental health, the health of our brains, and the role that music may play, we need to look at the evidence from evolution that shows how important music is to how our brains develop.
Why is Classical Music Good for the Brain?
About 40,000 years ago, groups of early humans called “Cro-Magnon” relentlessly chased herds of moving deer and wild boar across the frozen landscape of central Europe. Those hunters had a lot to deal with. As they left the Middle East, they ran into harsh winters and huge, endless forests that were hard to get through. But these early humans brought their technology and creativity with them, which helped them quickly establish their presence against all odds. They also brought music with them.
In 2009, scientists found the oldest known musical instruments in a cave in the south-west of Germany. They were four flutes that were made in a clever way to make different tones. One is about a foot long and is made from a vulture wing bone. Some were made from the ivory of mammoth tusks to make a deeper sound. Not only did these early musicians have time to play and make cave art, but they also had time to make instruments.
Scientists are pretty sure that music is so basic to who we are as a species that it goes back to when we were just babies. About 200,000 years ago, the modern human brain came into being because of a positive cycle involving diet, culture, technology, social relationships, and genes. And the rest is history: music got into our minds.
From the first Egyptian choral music to the Classical and Romantic symphonies of the 18th and 19th centuries, we can see how important music is in all cultures and times.
Greek philosophers thought about how music, the art of the nine daughters of Zeus, the king of the gods, and Mnemosyne, the Titan goddess of memory, could help people feel better. People of all ages around the world enjoy music. We don’t have to do much research to know this. Longfellow said, “Music is the language that all people speak.”
We don’t have to be scientists to know that music gets us moving and makes us feel things. We might tap our toes or snap our fingers when the right song comes on. It might make us want to hum, sing, or dance. And even the most complex symphony can move us deeply. Music can make us think of things from a long time ago. It can bring back sights, smells, and feelings from the first time we heard the song that is now playing in the room.
What does science tell us about how music can help keep the brain healthy?
First, we must define it. Evolution has made it so that three important brain functions work together smoothly: executive function, which is our ability to think and reason, social cognition, which helps us get along with other people, and emotion regulation, which gives us a sense of well-being.
As a member of the expert music group that the Global Council for Brain Health brought together in 2020, two of the things we talked about really stood out to me. The first was that music is unique because it uses more parts of the brain at once than any other daily activity.
What does classical music do to the brain?
Parts of the brain that help with hearing and listening, movement, attention, language, emotion, memory, and thinking, as well as all four lobes of the cerebral hemispheres and the brain stem, are all in these regions. Music not only uses many parts of the brain, but it also helps those parts work better together. The group came to the conclusion that playing and listening are both great ways to keep your brain active and give it a full workout.
Second, the neuroscientists at the meeting kept saying that because there isn’t a critical mass of scientific research, they can’t answer with certainty the many claims that are made about music and the brain. (This was mostly because the people who pay for research didn’t put much value on the science of music.
This is a big problem because it makes it hard to make valid claims about the benefits of music, especially high-quality classical music, and it also keeps us from being able to suggest practical steps that are good for our brain health.) But there are a lot of things we know for sure.
Does music help keep you from getting dementia?
So, the $64,000 question. If cellist Yo-Yo Ma and guitarist Sharon Isbin both live to be 100, will their musical training help them fight off dementia? When you look at the evidence as a whole, it is clear that music has a lot of power to improve mental health and well-being.
But a lot of work needs to be done to fully understand some basic questions, like whether music helps us remember and think better as we get older and whether listening to or making music protects the brain against cognitive decline. For example, we know that playing a musical instrument requires a lot of different cognitive skills, like attention and memory, but we don’t know if using these skills over and over again keeps them in good shape as you get older.
There is also some evidence that playing an instrument throughout life is linked to a lower risk of dementia, but we don’t know if this is because playing music makes the brain more resistant to disease. We also don’t know if the evidence that resilience is found in the brains of musicians is only true for people who have been playing since they were young or if it is also true for people who start playing as adults.
That may sound like a long list of things we don’t know, but I’m still hopeful about the future. Positively, we know that music makes many parts of the brain work. We also know that music helps the brain connect and has a lot of therapeutic value for healthy aging, diseases like stroke, Parkinson’s, and dementia, and for reducing stress and making people feel better.
We need answers to the unanswered research questions to prove what we already know in our hearts about how important and relevant music is in all parts of life. I’m sure that the idea that music can restore, rejuvenate, and rebuild the brain will become the new common knowledge.
