The Importance of Music in Your Childs Life

Music is an incredibly powerful force for good throughout the planet, and the many benefits of music on human minds have been studied and documented for decades. But how can music specifically have a positive impact on the development, happiness and well-being of children? Ah, I’m so glad you asked! I thought it might be nice to explore some of the ways that music can help you have a happier, healthier, and even smarter child. Be sure to add your own thoughts or ideas in the comments and share with your friends and loved ones!

Infant Development

Studies have shown that infants start recognizing melodies and rhythms and try to move along with music before they even learn how to speak! Try incorporating silly made-up songs into every day activities like bath-time and feeding time to help your infant be calm throughout these routines and develop a sense of familiarity and comfort that comes along with rhythm and melody. These moments will become the first memorable musical events in your child’s life.

While infants do not have the ability to respond to music on an emotional level like older children and adults, a recent study conducted by Laurel J. Trainor at the McMaster University Department of Psychology shows that babies have musical preferences. Six month old infants showed preference toward consonant intervals as opposed to dissonant intervals. While adults may prefer music with dissonant tones that create interest or suspense, infants turn away from this type of music, which shows us that at even a very young age, music causes valuable and telling basic human responses.

Fostering Creativity

Music expands the mind! And that’s not just a saying that a music teacher writes in chalk on the board at the front of their class— it’s science! Studies of the brain show that music can help foster creative bursts of thought and expand the mind to take in more information about the world. And that’s what being a kid is all about— being creative and learning about the world around them.

Fostering musical creativity in grades two through four is especially important according to the Development of Music Creativity among Elementary School Students study from Midwestern State University. Eighty-nine randomly selected children in grades two, four, and six were given the Vaughan Test of Musical Creativity and the Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking. Results show that students in grades two through four undergo a music and creativity growth spurt, while students in grades four through six level off significantly.

Banishing Self-Consciousness

As young kids age into becoming preteens and teenagers, self-consciousness and lack of self-confidence can become a struggle. Instilling a comfort with singing, dancing, and playing simple instruments from a young age will help kids feel comfortable and confident later on by giving them something that they’re familiar and experienced with. Kids who sing, dance or play instruments are emboldened by their confidence to expand outward in other exciting ways, too.

Listening to music during the teenage years is another important way that kids express themselves, connect with each other, and unwind. Two Finnish scientists interviewed a group of adolescents to learn how they use music to improve their mood. The subjects noted their use of music to revitalize them in the morning, provide a sense of calm in the evening, distract their minds from unpleasant thoughts, and gain insights about their feelings by using music in a reflective state.

Social Bonding

Think back to when you were a kid. Remember how often you would call up your buddy to talk about how awesome the new album by so-and-so was and how you would listen to it together on your boombox (or record player, for older readers…)? This bonding over music is what makes music so truly magical— its a social experience, defined by people uniting over their shared love for beautiful art.

This kind of bonding happens during practice and performance as well. Is there any unit of people closer than a band? Their ability to work together to produce music that expresses their vision to the world is nothing short of miraculous. From anonymous garage bands to world famous groups of touring artists, collaborating and cooperating with others while sharing a common passion for music and creativity provides a valuable bond. 

There are few things on earth that can bring us together like music can, which is the greatest lesson I learned from traveling around the world playing my piano. Bringing that joy to the children in our life is one of the greatest gifts we can give them, and will help them appreciate the joys and beauty of music well into adulthood. That’s the power of music.


They lit a 1000 lb Piano on Fire and what they did next will Blow your Mind!

The video speaks for itself. This is simply the craziest thing I've ever seen done with a piano. 

Dont worry! The piano was old and unplayable. So we might as well light it on fire and throw in 100 feet into the air! 


This is what you Missed at Burning Man 2015

For those of you that dont know what Burning Man is, it is a festival of festivals. But really, its not a festival at all. It is a city. Every year more than 70,000 people gather in a Nevada desert and build a city with a gifting economy. Whats a gifting economy? It means that there is no currency and there is no trade. Its about sharing and giving to others. 

But what makes Burning man so incredible is that almost everything and anything you can think of exists there. If you want to hear classical music, it exists. Jazz? No problem! Naked Yoga? Sure! Why not?

And to make things even more interesting you're in a sweltering desert with dust storms which make things really difficult sometimes. This year there was a dust storm with 60 mph winds that sent a support beam flying through a windshield. This is no joke! It can get dangerous out there. 

I've been to Burning Man twice and every year is just as interesting as the last. There is always something new to discover and there is no way for you to see it all. 

I made this video to give you an insider look to what happens at Burning man. 

Music by Prismatic Mantis. 

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Piano on the Edge of a Cliff in Canyonlands, Utah

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I recently went on a roadtrip throughout the United States (My 6th Piano Roadtrip so far...) and I spent a lot of time in Utah and Colorado. Canyonlands National Park in Utah was definitely a highlight!

If you havent been to Canyonlands yet, YOU MUST VISIT! It is certainly one of the most rustic and exhilarating experiences I've ever had at a National Park. The reason why its so great is because there are so many options for you to explore. You'll find a plethora of dirt roads throughout the park that allow you to explore the deep depths of the canyon. 

Not to mention the EPIC views, this place is better than the Grand Canyon, in my opinion. 

Below you'll find a video of me bringing my piano to the edge of a cliff in Canyonlands Utah and the difficulty I went through to play my piano on the edge of a glorious cliff in Canyonlands Utah. 

Dont forget to subscribe to my Youtube Channel for more awesome videos!

10 Reasons Why You Must Listen to Live Music

1.) You can feel the music. Listening to music on your iPhone simply can’t replicate the powerful feeling of having the bass hit your chest and high-end sounds surround you on all sides. It’s the most primal, ancient way to hear music and there’s simply no substitute for it.

2.) Live performance carries an energy that recordings can’t match— the thrill of musicians performing together in front of an audience, with no do-overs, is a powerful and exciting thing to witness in person.

3.) For aspiring musicians, seeing a live show is an excellent way to see both the work that must be put in to become truly great, and the rewards of that dedication. Seeing live performers at the top of their craft is both inspiring and instructive for learners and budding musicians. Many all-time great artists can point to a specific concert as the moment they knew they were in love with their craft.

4.) Concerts are a communal event— there’s something that changes within a group of people in a shared space who are all enjoying the same performance. It’s an intangible since of community and love that transcends language, culture, or background. And it happens whether you’re in a group of ten or a group of ten thousand.

5.) Concerts cut out the middle man. By the time a recording reaches your ears, it’s been assessed, marketed, changed, adapted for radio, and changed again. But live music is an artist or group of artists performing their craft directly to you. It’s a one-on-one communication that can’t be matched anywhere else.

6.) It’s simply fun! Going out to see a concert featuring a performer you love or a promising up-and-comer with your friends is an amazing, uplifting way to spend an evening. You’ll come away feeling energized in a way that you can’t imagine.

7.) You have a chance to enjoy the performance element of art. This might seem like it goes without saying, but live performance can often bring an entirely new visual and dynamic element to music that you can’t obtain with recordings. The truly great artists can even come to be known even more for their live performances than for their recordings.

8.) You’re surrounded by people like you! Even if you’re in a room full of strangers, you’re all united by one thing— your love for whichever artist you’ve bought tickets to see. You’ll look out at the sea of t-shirts and posters that you recognize and feel at home with people you’ve never met. It’s incredibly powerful.

9.) Merch! Live shows often feature merchandise that you can’t find anywhere else— tour shirts, exclusive recordings, posters and other keepsakes that you can use to commemorate your experience and profess your love forever.

10.) They’re romantic— many a great love story has began at a concert. If you’re looking to share a special moment with that special someone, or maybe even meet that special someone, there are few places more romantic than a beautiful concert featuring emotionally stimulating music. So go to a concert, and fall in love!

Dementia Takes; Music Gives Back

“Music is no luxury to them, but a necessity, and it can have a power beyond anything else to restore them to themselves, and to others, at least for a while.” – Musicophilia by Oliver Sacks, Neurologist

At the MacPhail Center for Music in Minneapolis, the Giving Voice Chorus offers a break from the disappointment and frustration of life with Alzheimer’s Disease. Caregivers and patients gather to celebrate, sing, and connect.

Sixty percent of the care facilities in Wisconsin use personalized playlists as part of the care routine for patients with dementia. Ranked #4 for lowest use of psychotropic drugs in nursing homes in the country, the Wisconsin Alzheimer’s Association credits the use of music for their advanced position.

Parts of the brain that process music, spared during even advanced stages of dementia, come alive when exposed to music from a person’s formative years. During the filming of the 2014 documentary, “Alive Inside,” director Michael Rossato-Bennet says that 75% of the dementia patients he filmed and spoke with during the making of the documentary showed huge and immediate improvement after listening to music. Personalized playlists are a great benefit to people suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease.

Research continues at George Mason University in Virginia. A group of scientist led by Catherine Tompkins plans to explore personalized music intervention on mood and behavior. A grant awarded to the college in September of this year will allow them to expand their studies to include residents of five adult day centers in Fairfax County. The subjects struggle with dementia.

As part of the study, three undergraduate Sociology students will interview the participant’s families to determine which types of music they most enjoy. Each participant will listen to music several times each week throughout the six-week study period on an iPod. At the conclusion of the study, the scientists will leave the iPods with the patients as a gift.

The care facilities involved are Music & Memory Certified Care Organizations. This non-profit organization’s goal is to introduce the advantages of listening to music to every care facility in the United States by offering elder-care professionals, nursing staff, and even family members of care facility residents, educational opportunities that will help them make digital music accessible to people with dementia. The organization hopes to have iPods in every care facility for residents to enjoy.

Judging from the research, both scientific and anecdotal, favorites songs may literally be Life Savers.

The Fall from Artist to Performer: Lady Gaga's Painful Wakeup call

“We are not actually communicating with each other. We are unconsciously communicating Lies.”

-Lady Gaga

A recent guest speaker at Yale University’s Emotion Revolution Summit organized by the Yale Centre for Emotional Intelligence and the Born This Way Foundation Stefani Joanne Angeline Germanotta (Lady Gaga) had a lot to say about the music industry and how its generic and completely fabricated culture takes so much from artists leaving them exhausted, disillusioned, and even ready to quit.

Never one to shy away from controversy, Lady Gaga experienced a fast rise from unknown musician to superstar pop music artist when Rolling Stone called her “the defining pop star of 2009.” Her Monster Ball Tour took the world by storm, but bankrupted Lady Gaga. The next year, she received three Grammys and released, “Telephone” with Beyonce. If you say the words “meat dress” in a crowd, someone will certainly recall the famous and fragrant frock of the 2010 VMA’s. No one remembers what any other artist wore that night. The fifth woman to reach over one million album sales in less than a week, Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way” was a smash hit right out of the gates. The “Born This Way” tour was one of the highest grossing tours of 2012.

But in 2013, she admitted, “I’m not longer an artist. I’m a performer.” How often do we really contemplate the difference between the two? After finishing “ARTPOP” she commented, “I feel empty and sad.”

Maybe other artists feel the same way. On the way to fame and fortune, they lost their sense of passion and their sense of direction and became performers feeding the insatiable appetites of their fans, the music industry, and even their own warped egos. In the age of social media, the rise to fame can give an artist a serious case of whiplash. Musicians go from unknown to ultra-famous in a matter of hours as videos go viral and the powerful influencers of Hollywood or Nashville see in them the potential to create revenue for the biggest machines.

 Disengaging from the music industry machine is nearly impossible. To make the transition from artist to performer is a combination of timing and talent. But finding the way back to an artist who pursues their passions is a complicated and difficult process.

So how shall we unwind ourselves from these destructive forces of social media, social pressures, and social expectations? Lady Gaga says it’s simple, but not easy.

“I started to say No. I’m not doing that. I don’t want to do that. I’m not taking that picture. I’m not going to that event. I’m not standing by that. Because I don’t believe in that.”