Singing Helps Keep Your Brain in Tune
When the Northern Virginia-based Senior Singers' Chorale--average age 80--belted out a Rodgers and Hammerstein medley, the audience went from "wondering who are these old codgers" to wild applause, says 81-year-old baritone Al Olsen. The biggest hit: a zesty men's section rendition of "There Is Nothin' Like a Dame."
Change the lyrics to "There is nothing like a choir," and you've summarized the findings of the ongoing study on creativity and healthy aging they're participating in. Begun in 2001 and cosponsored by George Washington University and the National Endowment for the Arts, the project follows folks ages 65 to 100 as they participate in community arts programs like the Senior Singles' Chorale. Compared with a control group of seniors who aren't involved in an arts program, the choir members not only are physically healthier--including fewer doctor visits and falls--but also more involved socially, less depressed, and in better spirits overall.
Yodel louder. "Music exercises the brain and the body," says Olsen, who enjoys the stimulation of learning new music and also finds himself "breathing more deeply and sitting up straighter," since he joined the choir a year ago. "Singing is a very physical process, and when you're making your music your body responds as if you were giving it a physical workout," says Eric Roter, a physician and musician who runs the website ermusic.org, which reviews the connections between music and medicine.
Roter points out that other studies have found that making music--singing or playing an instrument--can benefit seniors by reducing the risk of dementia as well as lessening the pain and stiffness of ailments such as arthritis. In fact, it's the multiple dimensions of music making--combining intellectual, physical, and social aspects--that appear to set it apart from other cognitively stimulating activities--like crossword puzzles, for instance--and that also can help keep us mentally alert even as we age.
This story appears in the December 26, 2005 print edition of U.S. News & World Report.