Music School Licensing

A few often-overlooked benefits are as follows:

• Confidence-building
  • Being able to stand in front of an audience and face the adrenalin of the moment by having prepared successfully is a life-lesson in and of itself.
• Stage-presence
  • Knowing how to communicate and ‘connect’ with others is a life-skill that is indispensable in leadership in any organization.
• Communication skills
  • Much communication in our world is non-verbal. There is body language and the nuances of tone and inflection. Music teaches the skills of communication that are intangibles and are picked up intuitively.
• Develops focus
  • In a world of distraction, there are few things that are as important to learn as how to focus on the task at hand. Being able to accomplish a task in the midst of chaos is possibly life-saving, and is developed as a central part of musical study.
• Eye/Hand coordination
  • The symbiosis of brain to body skills are maximized through the study of music. Science has found that the cerebral cortex of musicians is noticeably larger than most other people, because the memory of physical patterns that are developed.
• Two-handed coordination
  • Both sides of our bodies connect to alternate sides of our brains and the coordination of the sides of our bodies correlates to our brain’s activity, helping us to think wholistically and intuitively.
• Brain-plasticity
  • Scientific research has found that, particularly in aging individuals, that the study of music help the brain remain agile and adaptable. This is know as ‘brain plasticity.’
• Interpersonal cooperation (ensemble playing)
  • The development of empathy happens in musical environments that require not only an awareness of one’s own musical contribution, but also that of another person’s. This activity of ‘making music together,’ requires both parties to be intuitively aware of each other’s micro-adjustments of timing, intonation, and phrasing.
• Pattern awareness
  • Our brins see patterns all around us. This is how we perceive ‘truth.’ When a pattern doesn’t fit, we pick up on it. The musical compositional technique know as ‘motivic development’ is seen throughout Classical music, especially, and sparks awareness in our consciousness of patter-recognition.
• Learning personal discipline
  • The prerequisite to successful musical training is the willingness to ‘play the long game, ‘ through patience, day by day developing skills over time.
• Understanding long-range goals/preparation
  • Learning how to pace long-range goals and time them over months of preparation to a performance date has enormous applications in leadership in one’s own personal life as well as in leadership, in general.
• Listening with attentiveness
  • Leadership requires listening. If a leader stops listening, he will fail in his endeavor to lead the organization. Music requires listening attentiveness.
• Appreciation/awareness of beauty
  • In a world where much focus is on the depravity of humanity and wars all around, without an avenue to bring awareness of beauty and grace, where would we be?
• Conflict resolution (dissonance, homophony)
  • In life, as in music, there is conflict and resolution. How to handle conflict, or difficult circumstances is simulated through musical studies.
• The “Mozart effect,” brain stimulus
  • There is growing research that shows the effect music has on mental development, through the awareness of patterns, particularly of Bach and Mozart. Students who listen to highly patterned music before exams are shown to have higher test scores.
• Historical awareness (art influences and is influenced by culture)
  • The way art influences history and vice versa is highly interesting and valuable to know, as history tends to repeat itself.
• Humanities and Culture study preparation
  • The study of history and culture will have a dramatic effect on the decisions we make, both individually as well as in culture. Music plays a vital role in understanding the humanities.
• Preparation for art history
  • Those who are interested in the arts, as a whole, can see the parallels between sculpture, music, architecture and philosophy.
• Perception of inter-artistic disciplines
  • How the arts work together to gain an understanding of a particular culture or historical era can help the student of history have a three-dimensional perspective.
• Perception of worship dynamics
  • Throughout human history music and worship have been intertwined.
• Creative, independent thinking
  • Music helps people think differently, in a more mosaic way. It is a creative way of thinking ‘outside the box’
• Foundations for understanding the universal study of frequency
  • Music plays with the very resources of nature, giving us wonder and discovery through experimentation and enjoyment.
• Mathematics
  • The great physicist, Albert Einstein, who was of necessity highly skilled in mathematics, played violin his whole life and enjoyed playing in string quartets. He famously said, “Imagination is more important than knowledge.”