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Your Child's MindTrusting God's Design to Guide Your Child's Development |
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Music has a powerful influence at any stage in brain development. During the early preschool years it is used as a carried to learn Bible verses and important facts. Playing an instrument in a band is excellent for stimulating neural networks in many areas of the brain. We mentioned in the section on the teen brain that music is processed in multiple parts of the brain. However, the pre-frontal cortex, which is developing during the teen years, is a large area for musical processing. This is part of the reason that music takes on new importance during the teen years. However, we, as parents, have largely never learned the power of music. Plato in The Republic records Socrates as saying, "Musical training is a more potent instrument than any other, because rhythm and harmony find their way into the inward places of the soul, on which they mightily fasten." And, Napoleon asserted, "Give me control over he who shapes the music of a nation, and I care not who makes the laws." Music is powerful. Music Therapy is an area of medicine that uses music to bring about changes in the body. Dr. Norm Weinberger has established a database of the music therapy research at the University of California Irvine at www.musica.uci.edu. We are confused as parents because we do not understand that it is not just the lyrics that communicate morality, but the music itself. Music is not amoral. The way notes and rhythms are arranged communicates to us in a universal language. We have to train our ears again to discern the message in the music. Young children can point to the appropriate happy, sad, or frightened face picture when different types of music are played. We understand, at a very early age, what the music is communicating to us on an emotional level. This is the same across most cultures. It is universal! Interestingly, musicians can play the same piece of music with differing emotions and we will understand the emotion they intend to communicate! We are born with the capacity to recognize this language of music. Infants recognize whole contours of music and can distinguish if one note is played "wrong" in a chord or simple melody. Music is divided into three main parts for simplicity; rhythm, harmony and melody. The rhythm is what appeals to our body. Melody appeals to the spirit. And harmony appeals to the mind. The mathematical relationships that exist in music are the harmonies. The perfect frequency ratios as notes resonate is harmony. An octave is a 1:2 ratio. A Fifth (from middle C to G) is 2:3 ratio. A Third (from middle C to E) is 4:5 ratio and a Fourth (from middle C to F) is a 3:4 ratio. If you have a child interested in the math aspects of music visit www.mathforum.org. Heavy rhythms appeal to our body. They make us want to move. Drummers keep soldiers marching. Waltzes sweep us along a dance floor. The faster heavy metal and rock rhythms have given rise to Mosh Pits because they increase aggression. Faster music releases adrenalin. Fast music, 130 - 200 beats per minute, is able to activate the noradrenergic system and the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal axis more than slow music. This is our "flight or fight" part of our nervous system. For more information on Music visit the Products page. Music is discussed in the book Your Child's Mind and in Audio CD Part II. |
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