music makes a difference

by Carina Norlund

I was three years old and I loved to sit and doodle on the piano. I wasn’t particularly musically talented and most of it was just touching various keys and listening to the sounds of each key.

But I do remember loving melodies from an early age and as soon as I could remember my own made-up melodies, I would play them over and over again. I sang all the time too, at first to my parents delight and as time went on and their ears got tired, with partial annoyance.

Everything needed a melody to me. Singing went really well with taking a bath, traveling in the car (12 hour trips up to Northern Sweden pretty much put my parents and my younger brother in “Carina’s music hell”), getting dressed, walking to school, cleaning off the kitchen table (glasses make a really nice sound too when you use a fork to play on them!), going to the bathroom, vacuum cleaning (the vacuum gave me a humming tone as my bass sound and I could add some beautifully ostinato melodies on top of that), playing with my little brother and teaching him every nursery rhyme I knew and so on. I loved singing and did it, as already mentioned, all the time.

I was told I had a nice voice but was all too shy to share it voluntarily with anyone except my closest family and friends. I started taking guitar lessons at the age of eight years old. It came easily to me and I found I didn’t use much time practicing the music I was sent home with but rather spent my time writing little melodies and using the 3 chords I knew at the time to accompany my singing. I could sit in my room playing and singing for hours.

Of course I listened to what most young kids listened to in Sweden at the time; the Osmonds, ABBA and a bunch of other Swedish artists. I stood in front of the mirror with a hair brush for a mic pretending to be Marie Osmond and Annifrid Lyngstad (ABBA) and sang my heart out.

My father and mother both loved jazz. At the time, to me jazz music sounded like a lot of musicians playing different songs at the same time. Except for a song or two which more clearly presented a simple melody, my ears and brain would hurt while listening. As time went on I became more and more intrigued with jazz music and finally came to love it as well as most other music genres.

I sang in church choirs, sang solos, played in guitar groups, took piano, flute, bass and drum lessons, wrote tons of music, played in a pop band, sang in pop and jazz groups and so much more. Music was then, and still is, a very big and important part of my life.

So now you are wondering why I am sharing this with you.

Well, I am trying to show you that despite not being a musical wonder child and thanks to supportive parents I was able to learn to sing and play many music instruments and understand the World of music very well.

I believe every child is born with a love for music and that with the right support any child can learn the gift of music.

Do I believe I am a smarter person because of my musical life? Yes, without a doubt and I believe I’ve also lived a healthier and happier life:

1. being active in music kept certain parts of my brain activated which otherwise may have, literally, fallen asleep (see my research links to find out more)

2. listening to music in many different languages gave me an easy way to become accustomed to sounds of different languages (I speak 4 languages, some more fluent than others)

3. dancing kept me physically fit and being part of all the choirs and various music ensembles gave me a sense of belonging to something bigger and made me grow as a person while sharing feelings through music with others

4. being so involved with music, and a few other activities, kept me from bad influences as I hit my teenage years

5. practicing music enhanced the sense of self discipline which carried over into schoolwork and other parts of my life

6. playing and singing music gave me a great outlet to express myself

I don’t think you should only learn about music if you have shown a great talent, have decided to be in a band or want to make music your career.

To me, and most European, African and Asian families, art and music is a way of living and an important feature in one’s every-day life.

Unfortunately, this is not the case here in the US and I dare to challenge any American who don’t believe that all the positives I experienced while learning about music, would change the American culture for the better. And that is not even touching on the positive impact music has on young children while they are perfecting speech, improving their motor skills and more, including giving them an overall good feeling while experiencing it.

(You can find out more on the importance of music in a developing brain of a child by going to my research links).

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