[HN Gopher] New links found between musical training and cogniti...
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New links found between musical training and cognitive ability
Author : prostoalex
Score : 234 points
Date : 2022-04-28 15:12 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (neurosciencenews.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (neurosciencenews.com)
| upupandup wrote:
| Seeing that much of music, frequency and vibrations in general,
| are geometry, and any sort of structured order in the universe
| carries an intrinsic mathmatical properties its not hard to see
| why: rhythms, melody, pattern recognition, numbers, hand eye
| coordination, memory, concentration, improvisation, listening.
|
| Music is synchronization of all these skills that are built over
| time. You could read a book on calculus and start solving
| problems but you wouldn't be able to read a book on the piano and
| start playing any meaningful sounding pieces.
|
| So much of training, especially classical music, puts heavy
| emphasis on fundamentals I listed. It's only when you reach a
| certain breakthrough in proficiency in all the skills listed, you
| are in position to start taking on new scores but even then
| requires you to apply the same set of training although sight
| reading is probably the biggest measure of one's musical
| abilities.
| mr90210 wrote:
| Literally just found this while leaving my piano class.
| irrational wrote:
| I hope this is not true. I not only lack musical ability, I have
| musical anhedonia.
| RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote:
| As mentioned in other comments, there are a lot of confounding
| factors.
|
| One of the big one is the selection bias by parents.
|
| I would guess that most musical training starts in childhood and
| is facilitated by parents.
|
| Also, most parents who are this involved would place schoolwork
| above musical training. Thus, the kids enrolled in musical
| training are ones that are doing well in their classwork.
| lifeisstillgood wrote:
| Can music be separated from other skills that take time and
| practise to acquire?
|
| (This is more of a experimental design question than anything
| else - am interested)
| jrochkind1 wrote:
| I feel like this is "water is wet", except that they need Science
| (tm) to justify teaching music to kids in school, because the
| only reason to learn how to play music is if it will make you
| better at _something else_ that really matters. ?!?!!
| suifbwish wrote:
| Before this gets sensationalized more than it has, let's consider
| that cognitive ability also plays a heavy roll in learning to
| play music. There may be some net synergistic effect music
| playing has on other cognitive function but the brain is also
| effected heavily when listening to music. I suspect there is not
| a link between musical training and cognitive abilities but they
| are the result of having a brain that can function well in
| whatever it does.
| user3939382 wrote:
| Reading your comment I remembered a story I heard about Jimmy
| Reed. Who knows if it's true, but the story was that he wasn't
| sharp enough to remember the words to his own songs, and his
| wife had to stand behind him on stage and whisper to him to
| remind him. Hell of a blues player though
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9xXchxodYg
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Reed
| Melatonic wrote:
| He could also be someone like me where it is just very
| difficult to separate the voice and words of a singer from
| the instruments. If I listen to a song and do not actively
| try to decipher what the singer is saying it becomes just
| another instrument.
| bambax wrote:
| McCartney says in an interview about the early days of the
| Beatles that they used to compose and rehearse new songs in
| hotel rooms with no recording device or paper, and the goal
| was to be able to play the new songs the day after.
|
| He says (quoting from memory): "if we couldn't remember our
| own songs how could we expect audiences to remember them?"
|
| If a song is hard to remember it may have a hard time
| becoming a hit.
| jessermeyer wrote:
| Nah, concert singers have teleprompts to remind them of the
| words. They never show the chords though. Curious divide.
| redmen wrote:
| It's all about the feedback loops between the brain, instrument
| and fingers.
|
| Musical training is an amazingly fast way to shape your brain
| if you know what you are doing. It's one of the few engaging
| activities that offer that quick feedback and covers so many
| areas of the brain.
|
| You can find hundreds of studies linking music and cognitive
| ability.
| whiddershins wrote:
| After a couple of years of learning Tai chi, my hand
| independence on piano altered dramatically.
|
| Hard to call it a coincidence. I think mind-body training can
| and does change cognitive ability, it's almost a given.
|
| If we doubt this, it's more likely our ways of measuring are
| goofed up.
| tragictrash wrote:
| It may be hard to call it coincidence for you, but to
| everyone else thats a sample size of 1.
| blastro wrote:
| Count it as N=2, my anecdote aligns with this one. :)
| noTooMooch wrote:
| treeman79 wrote:
| My cognitive ability started bouncing between near genius to
| hillbilly. (Medical issue)
|
| Was learning an instrument at the time. Was going really well.
| Then on bad weeks twinkle twinkle was a foreign concept.
|
| I had to wait for good weeks to make any progress.
| luckydata wrote:
| hi Taravangian!
| treeman79 wrote:
| His character is my entire world.
|
| For a long time I would take a simple memory test online
| each day to see how I was doing. Results were drastic
| changes day to day.
|
| I was trying to figure out what effect each of the dozens
| of medications doctors gave me we're having.
|
| A simple blood thinner stopped the non-sense.
| luckydata wrote:
| I'm glad you figured it out and also glad you got the
| reference. That book helped me think through so many of
| my absurd internalized able-isms and forced me to re-
| evaluate how I look at myself and others in the context
| of mental health
| elliotbnvl wrote:
| I will not allow this to become an underrated comment.
| kinleyd wrote:
| Why? I'm interested to know.
| treeman79 wrote:
| He has a magic power that changes his intelligence each
| day. Mostly Normal. Occasionally stupid or smart. Very
| rarely it would go to absurd extreme. Imagine waking up
| and before breakfast you solved unified theory of
| physics. Then got to work on something that might
| actually be hard.
|
| Part of the Storm-light archive. An awesome inspirational
| epic fantasy series. One that helped me during the dark
| days of recovery.
| InitialBP wrote:
| Hillbilly doesn't mean stupid, generally just isolated and
| sometimes uneducated.
|
| And I know plenty of them who play a banjo and a guitar
| exceptionally well.
| bennysomething wrote:
| http://www.tartansauthority.com/global-scots/us-scots-
| histor...
|
| The term redneck has quite a funny (if you are from
| northern Ireland or scotland) origin. Maybe mildly
| interesting to everyone else :)
|
| Though obviously it's lost that original meaning.
| alimov wrote:
| Glad I saw this comment before checking out my cart full of
| guitars, drums, pianos, and a harmonica. Joking aside, would it
| be a stretch to say that learning to play an instrument well
| also grows confidence and develops a level of perseverance?
| Being bad at playing an instrument can be pretty discouraging,
| until one day you start to get the hang of it, giving more
| confidence to continue practicing and learning. Maybe that
| perseverance* bleeds over into other areas.
| bityard wrote:
| If you've ever fell in love with a song, or an artist, or
| totally jammed out to some track in a manner that would be
| embarrassing had you been observed, or if you constantly walk
| around with a tune in your head, then yes, learning an
| instrument is a great idea. My guess is that anyone who
| appreciates music on a deep level is capable of playing it,
| if not artfully then at least competently.
|
| It's also a matter of finding the right instrument for you,
| which could turn out to be a surprise.
|
| I suspect I'm older than they typical HN demographic, but I
| made several attempts to learn piano over the years and was
| never able to stick with it. I also tried bass guitar and
| that was fun (and pretty easy!) but you only get so far
| without playing in a band which I never had the time for.
| Then I picked up my dad's accordion (of all things) and got
| to wondering what it would be like to learn to play a simple
| song on it.
|
| That was two years ago and since then I haven't missed a
| single day of practice, learning, or playing for fun. Which
| surprises the hell out of me, because I'm the kind of person
| who bounces from hobby to hobby and project to project and
| rarely finishes anything. It's frankly amazing to have
| _something_ I can say I have worked on (and towards) every
| day for a long time. THAT inspires confidence and some sense
| of self-worth. (And I generally need all of that I can get!)
|
| Sometimes it's frustrating to get "stuck" on a difficult
| piece or hand movement that's new to me, but I always have to
| remind myself that I've been stuck before and that I'll
| eventually get it right with enough repetition, even if it
| takes weeks. The joy felt when I finally _do_ get it right is
| so intense that it probably ranks up there with some of the
| best drugs, minus the considerable negative consequences.
| gatonegro wrote:
| This got me thinking. When I was young I took some guitar
| lessons, but the instrument never _clicked_ for me. Now I
| have a (very basic) Yamaha keyboard, which I thought I
| would learn to play "at some point". It's been years since
| I last touched it.
|
| > If you've ever fell in love with a song, or an artist, or
| totally jammed out to some track in a manner that would be
| embarrassing had you been observed, or if you constantly
| walk around with a tune in your head, then yes, learning an
| instrument is a great idea.
|
| That is very much how I am. I almost feel restless if I'm
| not listening to music, I wake up with specific songs in my
| head almost daily; I have a decades-old music collection
| with all sorts of stuff, from the most commercial pop
| imaginable to obscure metal bands, or bizarre experimental
| soundscapes that some people wouldn't even consider
| "music". Music is one of the constants in my life, and one
| of the few things that are guaranteed to bring me joy, or
| peace, or _something_.
|
| > [...] because I'm the kind of person who bounces from
| hobby to hobby and project to project and rarely finishes
| anything.
|
| Also sounds like me, 100%. Now I'm wondering if there's an
| instrument out there that I would be able to stick to.
| Goodness knows I could use something to keep my brain
| somewhat in line these days.
| markvdb wrote:
| Pro guitar teacher here. I recognise some things in what
| you say that leads me to speculate you might benefit from
| an accessible wind instrument. The saxophone might be
| something for you.
|
| Some reasons:
|
| - Wind instruments are fairly physical to play. That can
| be rewarding/refreshing after a day of playing in the
| geek world. As an aside, this makes them great for the
| many people with ADHD/ADD too!
|
| - Most wind instruments are monophonic. The complexity of
| an accompanying/polyphonic instrument is its own can of
| worms...
|
| - In many parts of the world, especially the western
| world, it's relatively easy to find a larger ensemble
| fairly quickly. The group can be a real anchor point.
| deskamess wrote:
| Thanks for the comment. I just posted asking about ADHD.
| What wind instrument(s) do you recommend for ADHD? Would
| polyphonic instruments pose a problem for someone with
| ADHD?
| jacquesm wrote:
| > Now I have a (very basic) Yamaha keyboard, which I
| thought I would learn to play "at some point". It's been
| years since I last touched it.
|
| If you have a free moment and you have your keyboard
| hooked up to the computer use Chrome and give
| pianojacq.com a try, let me know if I can help somehow.
| bityard wrote:
| I'm 100% certain that there's an instrument out there for
| you. Try a few things out, even if they look and sound
| like toys. Cheap instruments abound but even if you
| splurge on something expensive, most music instruments
| keep their value well enough to break even if you decide
| to sell them in a few years. (As long as you don't buy
| brand new.)
|
| One thing that _probably_ helped me stick with accordion
| is finding a role model early on. He's on YouTube and
| plays the instrument very well and is super friendly and
| enthusiastic. He never says, "this is the only way to
| learn X," like a lot of music teachers do. His philosophy
| is, "I'll show you some techniques that worked for me,
| give them a try and see if they work for you." I figure I
| can call myself successful if I'm only ever as half as
| good as him, in terms of both musical ability and his
| general outlook on life.
|
| The other thing is, first and foremost, play for fun!
| Yeah, it's a slog to get through some of the theory and
| repetition in the beginning but if you get burned out,
| find something more engaging to do for a while (e.g.
| mimicking a catchy pop song) and then come back to the
| theory later, knowing that grokking it will help you play
| cool stuff later.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Hah! Great you found your 'match'. Trying my hand at the
| piano for the third time in my life and having a ton of fun
| with it but I know I still suck and probably will for a
| long time to come. That moment you talk about hasn't
| arrived yet, it still requires a lot of thinking rather
| than that it is playing. I remember clearly the changeover
| moment on the sax when I could simply play what I wanted
| rather than to have to study each song from the beginning
| to find the right notes. And I can't wait to reach that
| level on the piano but piano is a lot harder than sax on
| account of the polyphony and I suspect at some level
| playing a monophonic instrument for a long time doesn't
| really help when you want to play piano, all I hear in my
| head is the 'lead'.
| bityard wrote:
| You're the pianojacq.com guy, right? I love the idea of
| the site and wish there was a way to use it with my
| accordion. I've been meaning to hook up my MIDI keyboard
| and give it a proper try. Although I play pretty much
| only by ear, being able to read sheet music well enough
| to use as a reference or guide would be a good tool to
| have in my belt someday.
|
| I'm still early in my journey but from what I can tell,
| the key to learning piano/accordion is practicing scales
| and chords more or less relentlessly _before_ trying to
| play anything more complex than Twinkle Twinkle Little
| Star. Once you get the hang of them, and spend a lot of
| time playing around with them in various combinations,
| finding the melody of any given song by ear is quite
| often trivial.
|
| And for what it's worth, the piano can be a monophonic
| instrument too. :) On the accordion, I'm still somewhat
| inexperienced so I generally only play one note at a time
| on the piano side. Which I can get away with and still
| sound decent because the bass side of the instrument is
| far easier to play and sound good on than the piano side.
| Put together, they sound passable even if you barely know
| what you're doing (like me!).
| jacquesm wrote:
| Hehe, I'd much rather be known as 'the pianojacq.com guy'
| than 'the webcam guy' :) Thank you for making my day.
|
| Accordion is going to be very tricky. I've been toying
| around with synthesizing the notes/chords and then to
| compare the spectrum with the microphone input, that just
| might work for accordion as well though those tines tend
| to have lots of harmonics that may make that harder than
| it seems. I haven't gotten this to work for piano yet,
| the idea is to have a 'virtual midi' device that just
| listens to the microphone and turns everything it hears
| into note on/off pairs. That way you could use the site
| with non-midi instruments.
|
| Agreed on sheetmusic reading skills being useful. For
| accordion jazz lead sheets might be useful as well.
|
| > the key to learning piano/accordion is practicing
| scales and chords more or less relentlessly _before_
| trying to play anything more complex than Twinkle Twinkle
| Little Star
|
| Yes... it is also stupendously boring which I think is
| why a lot of people get turned off from practicing. There
| has to be some way to make this fun.
|
| > Once you get the hang of them, and spend a lot of time
| playing around with them in various combinations, finding
| the melody of any given song by ear is quite often
| trivial.
|
| Picking out the lead is trivial, picking out all of the
| chords is not (at least, not for me!).
|
| > And for what it's worth, the piano can be a monophonic
| instrument too. :)
|
| That's very true :)
|
| > On the accordion, I'm still somewhat inexperienced so I
| generally only play one note at a time on the piano side.
| Which I can get away with and still sound decent because
| the bass side of the instrument is far easier to play and
| sound good on than the piano side. Put together, they
| sound passable even if you barely know what you're doing
| (like me!).
|
| My dad was very good at the accordion, he could play both
| the clavier one and the 'button' style (chromatic) one.
| He's long dead so I can't ask him for any tips.
| ushakov wrote:
| most people who start learning an instrument quit
|
| not quitting alone will eventually make you better than most
| who tried and quit
|
| speaking of personal experience
| jacquesm wrote:
| This is an excellent point. Perseverance is the key to most
| achievements unless you are one of those very lucky people
| that are naturally gifted and able to do something with
| only a very small fraction of the practice of the
| 'regulars'. Even then that isn't a guarantee because you
| still need motivation.
| gfody wrote:
| learning anything exercises your learning abilities and they
| get stronger. if we ever truly understand "learning ability"
| it's bound to include things like confidence and perseverance
| among other things. I feel like this basic intuition is
| behind every "links to cognitive abilities" study I've ever
| seen, even the recent one about daily drinkers (who probably
| just don't exercise their minds as much)
| RobertRoberts wrote:
| It could also be argued that music training is common and
| fairly consistent (results/goal wise) and therefore easy to
| measure. And it may be found that _any_ kind of very organized
| training over time provides the same sort of benefits, not just
| music specifically.
| cshimmin wrote:
| This is noted in the article, "A direct causal link between
| musical training and general cognitive faculties, however,
| seems unlikely."
|
| The point of the article is that they've found a specific
| neurological relationship between two types of working memory:
|
| "The results show that if musical training influences visual
| working memory, then it does so via the "detour" of musical
| working memory. In other words, by way of its primary benefits
| for musical working memory, musical training could have a
| positive effect on visual working memory as well."
| my_inner_wuss wrote:
| This article just reminds me of my struggle to learn anything all
| my life. I never got past playing basic chords when I owned a
| guitar, never could ollie when I owned a skateboard, never got
| past inertly riding waves in a straight line even though I lived
| at the beach for a year, still struggle to speak with natives in
| Spanish even though I've lived in Mexico for eight years.
|
| My attempts to push past these rungs just ended up in
| frustration. It made the next rung feel so far away and the grind
| feel so pointless, I would sheepishly give up and figure it's
| just not for me. Especially when watching everyone zoom past
| while putting in a fraction of the time.
|
| I have pretty low confidence for learning new things sometimes
| because of this. I like the mindset of being able to master
| anything that I put some time into, but then I think of the whole
| summer I spent as a teen trying to ollie on my driveway only to
| come out so fruitless that I never took my skateboard out of my
| closet again.
|
| Only thing I managed to presumably master (at least let me use
| that word) was building things in software. And I suppose
| personal fitness/nutrition, as I'm rather proud of the habits
| I've built.
|
| I do have rather catastrophic ADHD, though. I'm sure it's
| related. My dark passenger.
| deskamess wrote:
| Can learning to play a musical instrument help with ADHD?
| steve_adams_86 wrote:
| It certainly helped me. Exploring music opened my mind up to
| both my potential ability as well as the technical side of
| audio, which lead fairly directly to me becoming a programmer.
|
| Video games and guitar are like the foundation of my career. I
| needed to know how they both worked, and that journey exposed
| me to so much cool stuff. I really can't see how a musical
| instrument would hurt, and I see plenty of reasons as to why it
| would help.
|
| The key is wanting to play.
| Kalanos wrote:
| music flexes a generative "muscle"
| swamp40 wrote:
| At my junior high, the band teacher had access to everyone's IQ
| test scores and went around scooping up all the smart people.
| Probably illegal now. Sure to skew any cognitive/music related
| studies.
| rednerrus wrote:
| Playing a musical instrument is like weight lifting for your
| brain.
| criddell wrote:
| There's a big physical part too I think. I've been trying to
| learn guitar on and off for thirty years and I think a certain
| lack of coordination and muscle memory, poor sense of rhythm,
| and some degree of tone deafness has made it a real struggle.
| nescioquid wrote:
| There is a large portion of music performance that is simply
| muscle memory, but probably a larger portion is really
| perceptual.
|
| In order to develop better motor skills, you need to be
| guided by the resulting sound compared with an intention, an
| idea of the sound you want. This implies that the first thing
| that has to change is perception and imagination.
|
| There's a literature on how to practice music. Many of the
| techniques you'll encounter really have to do with aiding
| perception (the idea, the sound, awareness of what you are
| _actually_ doing) and interfering with "muscle memory" so
| that you can break down and improve execution.
|
| Coordination, rhythm, or pitch will not improve until
| perception does, but perception can certainly be trained and
| improved!
|
| Also -- just try practicing something intensely for 10
| minutes, then practice/play something else. Then come back
| next day after a good sleep. The improvement that happens
| while you sleep is almost creepy.
| lil_dispaches wrote:
| Why is this world so backwards? Humans have musical _ability_ ,
| and cognition requires _training_ (that 's opposite of OP).
|
| You don't train on music, you train on technique (and practice
| music, or play).
|
| You were not born with the innate "cognitive ability" to know
| what these symbols mean, you must train yourself to recognize
| them, read them in many configurations, iow stay training or go
| dumb.
|
| The link OP found is the same link between spending extra on
| education and the expected outcome.
| 99_00 wrote:
| Title is editorialized
| nhlx2 wrote:
| "How well are you trained, in music?"
| leke wrote:
| I was a choir boy from a young age. Became head chorister.
| Achieved Deans and Bishop awards from the Royal School of Church
| Music. I also played classical guitar. On one music exam in
| school I got 99%. I can't remember what I lost the point on.
| Anyway, my point is, I'm dumb as fcuk. Scored terrible grades
| throughout my schooling and in my GCSEs, which is about the time
| I quit the whole thing.
| asdffdsa wrote:
| Musical training helps to delineate and connect different
| contexts together in real time. It also requires precise hand-eye
| coordination and fine motor skills executed perfectly (or as my
| instructor would say "as closely to perfect as you can: perfect
| does not exist").
|
| There's probably many domains it overlaps and assists with (not
| to mention the general philosophies that translate to other
| domains like creativity, continuity of motion,
| practice/discipline/feedback/improvement -- e.g. "music is the
| tool to express life" Herbie Hancock). Though naturally,
| excellence in one domain does not grant the knowledge necessary
| to be a master in another
| JasonFruit wrote:
| This has been talked about for decades, and it's always the same
| story: expose your child to music, or have them learn to play an
| instrument, because it'll make them smarter![0] Why can't we for
| once say that if you expose your child to music, and give them an
| opportunity to learn an instrument, they'll be more able to enjoy
| and understand music, and have a skill that can give them joy
| through their entire life? Not everything has to be about
| intelligence and success; some things can just be about pleasure
| and joy.
|
| [0] I know I'm somewhat mischaracterizing this article, but
| that's what the mainstream press makes of it.
| disqard wrote:
| I love this perspective, and feel the same way about not just
| music, but also programming -- why is the thrust on "STEM" so
| anchored in "so that they can grow up and have a programming-
| based career"? It's stimulating, fun, and a vehicle for
| reifying your ideas/creative impulses (applies to both music
| and programming). Let's leave it at that.
| ip26 wrote:
| I'm sure in a post-scarcity world we _will_ leave it at that.
| xmprt wrote:
| Also there's a lot of research into musical training however
| this doesn't mean that playing sports or video games can't have
| similar (or potentially even better) benefits.
| shapefrog wrote:
| One time at band-camp ...
| sharkweek wrote:
| Random story time:
|
| My dad put above average pressure on me to learn piano as a kid.
| I got somewhere between decent to quite good but never a prodigy
| or anything (could read almost any piece of moderately difficult
| sheet music and play on sight, never really got into writing my
| own music).
|
| When I was in early high school I made an argument that I wanted
| to quit and he said it would be up to me but that I would regret
| it later in life. I ignored him, gave up piano, and now 100%
| without a doubt wish I could go back in time and stick with it.
|
| Still, I'm grateful I got the opportunity to learn music, as now
| it's a huge part of my life (tinker on guitar, always on the hunt
| for new artists to listen to, etc).
|
| I have my own kids now, and it's fun watching them get interested
| in the instruments we've got around the house, but I'm also
| trying to figure out how to navigate the right amount of
| influence I should try and put on them to focus on music
| themselves.
| sfteus wrote:
| I quit in middle school due to a combination of it feeling like
| a chore, feeling like it was too "nerdy" during that age, and
| not really liking the teaching style of the instructor we found
| after moving. Definitely regret it now; I've since developed
| some joint issues in my fingers that make it difficult to play,
| and often wonder if sticking with it would have helped prevent
| that. Or potentially just made it worse I guess, no way to know
| really.
|
| W/R/T:
|
| > but I'm also trying to figure out how to navigate the right
| amount of influence I should try and put on them to focus on
| music themselves.
|
| Looking back, I've found the best thing that encouraged me and
| my siblings growing up was the interest and positive support my
| parents showed towards all of our interests. My mom would
| always comment on how much she liked hearing me play, even
| though I'm sure she was as sick of hearing the same song for
| the 800th time as I was. She was also super interested in the
| little gadgets I'd hack together when that started peeking my
| interest even if she didn't understand them at all. My dad made
| a point of always seeing if I wanted to help work on our cars
| when the mechanical aspect fascinated me, etc. And of course
| they remained supportive whenever our interests changed as we
| got older.
| Broken_Hippo wrote:
| _... and not really liking the teaching style of the
| instructor we found after moving._
|
| I had that same experience in 8th grade. I went from a school
| with fun instruction to a band teacher that seemed more
| concerned that your parents signed a practice sheet than in
| how well you actually played. I think the teacher seriously
| disliked his job.
|
| I don't regret it, though. I just did choir the next year or
| two (and again in college). Realistically, though, I always
| prioritized art over music and still make artwork (am over
| 40, so its been some time)
| jader201 wrote:
| > I'm also trying to figure out how to navigate the right
| amount of influence I should try and put on them to focus on
| [X]
|
| I think this is something most parents struggle with, myself
| included. I have a 17-year-old and 14-year-old, and still
| trying to figure that out.
| sharkweek wrote:
| Thanks for saying this. Our kids are younger but I have to
| resist the urge to try and force my interests on them,
| especially as they gravitate toward things that maybe I don't
| connect with myself.
| gwd wrote:
| What I'd like to tell my son when he gets older is that he
| has to choose _something_ to be putting regular effort into
| getting better. It can be music or baseball or chess or
| Overwatch, but he has to spend at least some time every week
| actively investing in a skill that takes several years to
| master.
|
| We'll see how that turns out. As a toddler he pretty
| naturally pushes himself to master skills at his own pace;
| hopefully that attitude will continue.
| luckydata wrote:
| I did EXACTLY that. My rule was 1 instrument and 1 sport
| and couldn't be play cause that he'll do for free.
|
| We started when he was 5 and he's 7 now. So far things have
| worked out, highs and lows abound. Stick to it, it's worth
| it.
| xmprt wrote:
| What do you mean by "couldn't be play"?
|
| I feel like the best way to learn/improve at something is
| by making it fun. Often times different people find
| different things fun so if I'm able to have fun doing
| something that others find to be a chore then I have a
| natural competitive advantage.
| luckydata wrote:
| he's got plenty of playtime, but that's not gonna teach
| him any work ethics. I don't need to MAKE him play xbox
| for 5 hours during the weekend, he's perfectly capable of
| doing that on his own.
| jimmyjazz14 wrote:
| No offense but I'm glad my parents were not like you
| sounds like a lot of pressure to have hobbies your kids
| don't enjoy.
| luckydata wrote:
| Those are not hobbies, they are part of his "job". I'm
| not taking offense, but I'm glad my parents gave me some
| discipline and I wish they did more of that.
| jimmyjazz14 wrote:
| ah okay, well I certainly wouldn't criticize others
| parenting decisions I just know that for me that wouldn't
| have worked very well as a kid. My parents just made me
| work and do chores and music was something I did for fun
| away from doing my "job".
| tomtheelder wrote:
| My parents basically had the same rule, and I couldn't be
| more grateful. Helped me cultivate focus, dedication, and
| work ethic in a way that I never would have otherwise,
| given how easy school was.
|
| On top of that I still get huge enjoyment out of soccer
| and guitar, and I see many of my peers experiencing
| regret that they did not take those sorts of hobby type
| pursuits more seriously as a kid.
| jimmyjazz14 wrote:
| My parents encouraged me to have hobbies which I
| appreciate but they did not force me to play an
| instrument.
| wmil wrote:
| I'd say that teaching kids piano is a mistake. It gets them
| zero respect as a teenager, so they tend to quit.
|
| You should really look into a string path, like ukulele to
| guitar once their hands get large enough.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Pretty hard disagree. You'd be much better off to teach your
| kids that respect from their peers is fickle and that it
| matters whether _they themselves_ feel that it is worth their
| time. Otherwise they 'll end up doing anything stupid in
| order to get their peers to like them which is setting them
| up for massive problems when their own judgment is all that
| will keep them safe.
| criddell wrote:
| The guitar feels like an instrument that is once again in
| decline as far as importance in music goes. I might not get
| them a piano, but a keyboard of some type with a DAW could be
| a pretty good choice, depending on what music your kid likes.
| jimmyjazz14 wrote:
| yeah I'm pretty decent at guitar but nobody really cares
| they can easily find way better guitar players on Youtube.
| Honestly if you want respect from others learning to play
| musical instruments ain't going to get you very far in
| general.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Indeed, and that's really a bad motivator anyway.
| Accomplishment is a goal all by itself.
| mbg721 wrote:
| But then they would learn to number their fingers wrong. 1 is
| the thumb, dang it.
|
| Piano skill is pretty transferrable to other instruments. It
| has the same advantages as the guitar in that you can play
| entire chords at once and you don't have to empty your saliva
| out of it, but I at least think it's easier to get into music
| theory when you have the white and black keys in front of
| you.
| Terry_Roll wrote:
| >My dad put above average pressure on me to learn piano as a
| kid.
|
| Family did similar with musical instruments, I wasnt
| interested, as this was when singles and record players were
| becoming mainstream as a primary school kid I was doing some of
| the basics for dj'ing, way before Technic's 1200's/1210's
| things like beat cancelling by turning the bass down,
| scratching that sort of stuff, real elementary stuff. It really
| really annoyed the family, doing all this weird stuff to
| records and look at how DJ's are festival gods today! I wished
| I stood up to them more but as a kid thats not possible, so you
| take the next best option and do some coding because family
| want a quiet life, dont want kids causing hassle things like
| that.
| luckydata wrote:
| I have a 7yo and I told him there's a very simple rule: he
| needs to learn an instrument cause it's good for focus, as a
| practice for doing work and it ends up being fun once you stick
| to it. He can pick the instrument, or change it if he doesn't
| like what he picked, but he can't do nothing, that's not an
| option.
|
| He oscillates from finding it a chore to being really proud of
| his achievements (he's a drummer for now). It's kinda funny
| sometimes he does both in the same day.
|
| Overall I'm comfortable with it being mandatory, as a parent my
| job is to raise him to be a well functioning and happy adult,
| not to make him happy right here and now, and he gets it.
| davzie wrote:
| My children are going to have the same requirement. One of
| them is the same age. I was raised with he same requirements
| and I hated it at times. But I am _so_ thankful my parents
| kept me at it because it's a huge source of fun, creativity,
| relaxation and joy to now be able to play like I do. Had I
| been allowed my own way, I would have quit, but it wasn't
| until I was 15 and joined a covers band that I truly started
| to "get it". I'm glad others see the benefit and are
| following a similar path!
| jimmyjazz14 wrote:
| Even though I play multiple instruments I have pretty
| actively avoided even encouraging my kids to play a musical
| instrument I always felt like the more I pushed them into the
| less fun it would be for them. Honestly I probably would have
| gained a high level of resentment around music if my parents
| forced it on me.
| ushakov wrote:
| sounds familiar, although the only difference for me is that i
| never choose to quit!
|
| but you too can go back, find a teacher and start learning
| again!
| msluyter wrote:
| Preface: I have a pretty deep musical background; bachelors &
| masters degrees in flute performance.
|
| I have a 7 yr old. Her kindergarten required either piano or
| violin, and we opted for piano. At that time, we implemented a
| daily '5 minutes of piano' mini-lesson where I'd help her with
| her current lesson/song. We're doing homeschool now, but have
| kept up the '5 minutes of piano'. My daughter doesn't really
| like it that much, tbh, but I've made her stick with it
| because: a) she's actually quite talented -- great
| pitch/rhythm, and can already play by ear, for example, and I'd
| like to get her to a point where she can really enjoy that
| talent, and b) as a general lesson in perseverance/grit/skill
| mastery.
|
| But I really struggle with the notion that the above is simply
| a rationalization and that I'm really trying make up for my own
| failure[1] to achieve my own musical goals vicariously through
| my daughter. And I've also struggled not to force it too much.
| I've bent over backwards to make it fun -- I make up games, do
| a variety of musical/rhythmic activities like drumming,
| dancing, or even playing pattycake, or do things like watching
| Fantasia or even listening to pop songs. And I've had to put
| the brakes on thoughts like "we're going to polish the crap out
| of this song so we can impress the relatives" and focus more on
| the overall process: is she having fun? On the other hand, I'm
| trying to not reward a "this requires some effort so I'm going
| to quit" type of mindset.
|
| It's definitely been a tough balancing act.
|
| [1] How I used to perceive it -- I no longer feel that I was a
| "failure" so much as I chose a suboptimal path.
| andkon wrote:
| One thing that can make it fun, speaking as a former kid who
| grew up playing fiddle, is to get to play with other kids and
| connect with other kids through music. Maybe that's tough
| with piano, but youth orchestra, band, fiddle circles, all
| sorts of things offer them the chance to find other people
| with whom they can make their instrument their own thing, and
| not just yours. Though there is always a helpful role for
| parental encouragement in practicing - because damn is that
| part not fun.
| gowld wrote:
| "I wish I had something that I didn't put the work in to get"
| is a common 'deathbed' regret, much like "I wish I worked less
| but still got paid the same". I wouldn't read too much into it.
|
| Stated vs Revealed preferences, and all that.
| [deleted]
| scelerat wrote:
| playing music, writing, learning a foreign language, and certain
| types of coding all tickle my brain in similar ways
| ipiz0618 wrote:
| I always think musicians are some of the smartest people in the
| world. Being able to memorize hundreds of songs / pieces is
| impressive alone. Most of them are also capable of improvising
| and adding their own interpretations (e.g. in classical music)
| spontaneously. It's something that a lot of people including
| myself could never understand how to do well.
| chris_st wrote:
| This comment reminds me of the meme that floats through the
| guitar groups I'm on. It goes something like:
| - Person 1: Wow, you're an incredible musician! -
| Musician: Thanks, it's taken a lot of work. - P1: How
| is it possible you play so well! - M: Lots of practice?
| - P1: It must be inborn talent! - M: No, it's mainly
| practice... - P1: You must have musician genes!
|
| etc. ad infinitum.
|
| And, to be honest, I kind of thought this myself as well. When
| I saw the scene in "Soul" where the piano player figures out
| the key of the song after playing one wrong chord, then one
| right chord, I thought, "Miraculous!" Now, after playing bass
| for just over a year, yeah, not as big a deal as I thought
| originally.
| ushakov wrote:
| yeah, the magic wears off quickly
|
| i used to look up AC/DC, but now that i know how _literally_
| all their songs work i find it rather boring and not very
| intellectually challenging
| ipiz0618 wrote:
| You're absolutely right. I play music too and I understand
| how practice is a huge part of this. That's how I perceive
| intelligence - some people never stop learning and improving,
| which is what makes them smarter than others. Surely some
| were born more talented than the others, but they also spend
| more time practicing than the others.
| aaaaaaaaaaab wrote:
| It's the same with programming. - How do you
| know what code to type in? - Ummm... I know what I want
| the program to do, and just write it down step by step.
| - No, I mean, how do you know what symbols to write?? -
| I... I learned their meaning...? - You're so lucky! I
| would never be able to learn such things, I was always bad at
| math xD
| stnmtn wrote:
| You would think you couldn't do it well, and that either you're
| born with the ability to do it or you aren't; but you'd be dead
| wrong. It's just practice. That's it.
|
| Given a couple years of regular-ish, semi-structured practice,
| you would be shocked by how much you can do. When you dive into
| music theory even just a small amount, it becomes very easy to
| improvise a melody in a given scale, or write a nice chord
| progression. It becomes Math.
|
| Most songs that you memorize are very similar, and the ones
| that are different you simply learn through muscle memory. I
| can't explain to you how exactly I can fingerpick a song like
| Blackbird, but I can do it and all it took was rote repetition
| until my fingers do it quite literally without my thinking
| about it.
| Melatonic wrote:
| For sure some are super bright but if you do anything for hours
| every single day you are going to get pretty damn good at it
| bityard wrote:
| I used to share that sentiment myself, until I (finally) picked
| up an instrument two years ago.
|
| It turns out, you don't get very far learning to play music
| without also incidentally gaining an intuitive understanding of
| how most songs are constructed.
|
| For example, most modern music is based on about three or four
| main chords put together in a certain sequence and then
| repeated throughout the song. If you know song well enough to
| hum it, and can figure out (or look up) what those chords are,
| then you are 80% of the way toward being able to _play_ the
| song because the melody is (mostly) made of up the notes within
| those chords.
| FredPret wrote:
| Humans: almost impossible to study.
| marcodiego wrote:
| I wonder if style plays a role. Classical musicologists always
| seemed smarter than pop musicians for me.
| causi wrote:
| How did this study differentiate between the effect of musical
| training and natural musical aptitude?
| randcraw wrote:
| Or whether musical training was recent or long past. Or whether
| performance was solo vs ensemble. Or what level of performance
| was achieved (occasional vs regular, personal vs serious
| avocational vs professional). There are a great many musical
| variables that need normalization given only 148 subjects. Even
| the variable they chose -- musical memory -- wasn't quantified
| in any recognized way that allowed meaningful comparison among
| subjects. Being able to recall a sequence of notes and their
| durations in a single-line melody is only one aspect of musical
| memory.
|
| It's a bit like assessing one's memory of a dance routine by
| asking how many steps were taken.
| randcraw wrote:
| I suspect there's more cognitive ability needed to play a musical
| instrument than just memory.
|
| I imagine there would be a significant difference in mental
| engagement when playing different kinds of instruments. Drums vs
| monophonic instruments vs polyphonics engage an ever increasing
| range of musical fundamentals and skill: from only rhythm and
| volume to a single line of melody to multi-line and harmony.
|
| A similar range of engagement (and control) may be needed to play
| instruments with fewer vs more degrees of freedom (three valves
| on one hand for a trumpet vs all fingers of both hands for a
| clarinet (yet monophonic) vs both hands for guitar or violin
| (asymmetric) or piano (symmetric) (all polyphonic). Instruments
| that make melody without frets also seem like they'd be more
| demanding (and more engaging) to play than those with.
| Instruments that allow more subtlety of expression should be more
| demanding cognitively too, like the human voice.
|
| I would imagine learning to play more complex instruments is more
| difficult later in life too (than learning to play those less
| complex), since the older brain is less plastic or absorbent.
| afry1 wrote:
| I'll play the role of the insufferable pedantic here and note
| that drums absolutely have an element of tone in addition to
| rythm and volume: the tuning of the drum heads, where you
| strike with your sticks (edge of the cymbal vs center of the
| cymbal), even mirroring what other instruments in the band are
| playing and accompanying those parts with your drums to augment
| the perceived tone of those other instruments for the audience.
| There's a lot you can do with tone!
| onion2k wrote:
| Now tech startups will ask devs to play a song in the 1st
| interview to make sure they're recruiting the cleverest
| candidates.
| gunfighthacksaw wrote:
| "Sorry, we're actually a pentatonic JS shop. Best of luck in
| your job search."
| BizarroLand wrote:
| Pentatonic JS is a subset of Major JS. If you had said
| mixolydian JS then that is understandable, have a good day
| shapefrog wrote:
| leetmusic tests incoming.
| ushakov wrote:
| to be honest, i'd rather take this instead of coding in front
| of somebody
|
| if you mess up in live performance, nobody is gonna notice
| unless it's real hard and if they do, they likely won't be
| able to remember
| shapefrog wrote:
| if it was anything like leetcode the question would be to
| play 3 notes and the interviewer would have to check the
| computer to tell if it was a C or a C#
| going_ham wrote:
| Why did you plant this idea on them? The hiring was already
| ridiculous to begin with. Now, how do I find a musical degree
| to flex on my resume? >:( !!
|
| Joke aside, I do not think that visual memory matters that much
| when it comes to doing our job. All we need is problem solving
| skills and there are definitely alternatives to improve those
| skills. One crucial being solving many problems on what we want
| to be good at!
| [deleted]
| belter wrote:
| You joke but they will say it is nothing new. :-)
|
| "Musicians as Programmers" :
| https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/musicians-programmers-michael...
|
| "... IBM preferred to recruit and train programmers from two
| different groups: musicians and accountants..."
|
| ...Now after this Quicksort implementation...Can you please do
| a "All the Things You Are" transposition into D Major using
| Java and without triggering java garbage collection? Let me
| know if the task is not clear. You have 30 minutes.
| luckydata wrote:
| bring it on, I have a full arsenal of guitars behind my desk
| and it's routinely a conversation starter for my meetings. I
| even played for my colleagues once or twice while we were
| waiting for others to join.
| entropicdrifter wrote:
| Are you me? My home office is in my music studio, so the
| guitars are mounted to the wall right behind me
| belter wrote:
| Both your statements support the claim :-) Now we just need
| to match musical instruments to programming languages, and
| we solved SWE hiring...
| ushakov wrote:
| i play both piano, guitars and synths, how would you
| match that with my programming language preferences?
| bityard wrote:
| Sounds like we found the Haskell developer!
| criddell wrote:
| I keep a guitar at work office as well as at home. I find
| it pretty useful when I'm stuck on some problem to pick up
| the guitar and do something that doesn't take a lot of
| thought (like play some scales or chord progressions).
| munificent wrote:
| When everything went virtual during the pandemic, I learned
| that roughly half of my team have some sort of musical
| instrument on display in their home office. Guitars are most
| common, but I saw a couple of ukeleles and a banjo. The best
| though was discovering that one coworker has a couple of very
| obscure modular synthesizers along with a Wurlitzer and some
| other nice gear.
| [deleted]
| d23 wrote:
| I'm not convinced that would be less effective than most tech
| interviews.
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