Why is music education so important?
First of all, we must answer the question of "Why is MUSIC so important?"
The answer to this question is quite simple or even obscure to some. "It's for entertainment!" I've heard some people say and from others I get a simple,"I don't know," but it is not all that simple. Music is the language of humanity. It is a language we can all understand. Music connects people from all over the world who might not understand each other when they simply say "Hello!" to each other.
Music has the power to convey emotion without saying a single word. For example, Beethoven, one of the most famous late classical and early romantic composers became deaf during his lifetime. In his 8th Piano Sonata, you can hear the anger, frustration, and sadness flow out from under the keys of a piano. He wrote this piece at the beginning of the decline of his hearing, and he was able to convey those emotions without using a single word.
So now that we have established the importance of music to expression and understanding, now it will be easier to see why music education is so important.
Reading music is akin to reading a whole other language and translating it in real time. This language is arranged in measures on a staff of five lines, notated by a series of dots which each represent a letter. These letters correspond to a fingering on an instrument where the musician compresses valves, pushes keys, or changes their air flow to create the sound. That sounds complicated, doesn't it?
Well, it is. The system for notating and playing music is extremely complex, and music notation and style has evolved over a series of 14 centuries. Normal reading classes in today's schools usually do not have the capability of teaching these skills. Reading music is like your language teacher placing a piece of writing in Russian on your desk and asking you to read it in English to the class. The only way you could do it is if you have prior knowledge of the Russian language, and even then it might be extremely difficult for a high school student to translate on the spot. Educating students in music can help practice these skills, and numerous studies that have been conducted on music students found a direct correlation between reading music and being able to easily learn a second language.
Another large part of reading music is learning how to translate rhythms. Rhythms are defined as divisions of measured music that indicates the sequence in which notes are played. In your general music classes throughout elementary school, middle school, and maybe even high school, you may have learned that each note has a duration value. Quarter notes are worth one beat, half notes are worth two beats, and whole notes are worth four beats. These notes can also be split into fractions. An eighth note is equal to an eighth of a whole note, and the same goes with sixteenth and thirty-second notes.
As music is read, along with reading what tones to play, the musician must also split these rhythms in their head. They are reading, counting, dividing, and translating at the same time. As a result, musicians tend to be the best multitaskers. Education studies and research have also found a direct correlation between musicianship and math scores on standardized tests.
Music has a way of opening a person's mind and heart, and helps facilitate a greater understanding of literature and critical thinking. How could that not be important?
