ON MUSIC AND OUR HEALTH

UNEXPECTED DIVIDENDS

An TV commercial for AIG while watching CNBC today caught my eye.  It made the claim that singing helps reduce stress and can add up to fifteen years to one's life.  I hadn't seen that before and got me wondering what the source of that claim might be.  A cursory Google search didn't turn anything up, so will have to dig around some more.

In the meantime, the Wall Street Journal had this interview on it's Health Blog with renowned literary neurologist Oliver Sacks that highlighted the following:

"Music has a deep connection to the workings of the brain. In his new book Musicophilia, literary neurologist Oliver Sacks writes about how rhythm and melody can trigger symptoms of neurological disease in some patients and help ease the conditions of others...

He describes how music helped him heal from a serious injury. He also connects the role of music in his own recovery with its role for patients stuck in a trance-like state decades after a sleeping-sickness epidemic. Their miraculous but temporary recoveries (prompted by a drug, not by music) were described in his book Awakenings, which was later made into a movie.

And Sacks explains how listening to music activates the region of the brain associated with motion–suggesting deep biological roots of dancing, or tapping our feet to music. Even when we imagine music, the brain’s motor cortex is activated. Imagining music, Sacks says, “is very real.”

Guess I need to spend more time with my iPod and iTunes.  Especially since Apple reduced prices for DRM-free music tracks on the service today. 

Also, can anyone recommend a good Karaoke machine?

Comments

[jon burg]

There was a time when I played with going into the field of Music Therapy Psychology. The basis for the field is enabling expression for the unexpressed (due to mental, emotional or physical limitations) through music.

If you can learn to appreciate music and understand the deeper emotions being expressed it opens up new worlds. The ability to express oneself through recreation of powerful pieces or express oneself through original composition is amazing.

This is speaking from personal experience. Musical composition is my release.