In the Times today, 20th October, 2014 there is a short article, ‘Poem a day is the say to stay young, says Dame Judi’. Apparently there was a YouGov poll looking at attitudes towards ageing. And Dame Judi Dench keeps her brain going by learning a new poem everyday. Tony Robinson, Baldrick in Blackadder, dreams of becoming a professional gambler whilst Noddy Holder of The Slade, wants to travel the world in his yacht.
Dame Judi learning a new poem a day is most admirable and will help keep her ability to learn her lines sharp. With the brain it is a case of use it or lose it. In fact this statement is true body wide, but that is beside the point here. However, Dame Judi’s brain is used to learning lines; a more powerful way of rejuvenating a brain is to learn something entirely new, whilst keeping the familiar stuff going.
And indeed, I was pleased to read that in the most popular wish list was learning a foreign language and learning a new instrument. Both are excellent ways of reinvigorating a brain. And the advantages of learning an instrument is the involvement of fine motor skills with the fingers, using the ears; learning how to listen and anticipate. If the instrument is classical, then the eyes are also used as we learn how to read music and translate what we read into music. All these have powerful positive effects upon various parts of the brain, cerebellum and brain stem.
In fact, learning anything that requires dextrous fingers improves our ability to do complex thinking tasks. It has been reported that children who learn a musical instrument are brighter. And there is no reason why this should be confined to children!
All we need is patience.
Before I came into this profession, I was a singer. When I first left university, I used to teach piano. What struck me about adult learners as opposed to children was that both adults and children progressed at about the same rate. But the adults were painfully aware of their slow progress, whilst for children, they were always learning and used to just getting on with it, instead of constantly looking to see how they were doing. So if we do decide to take up a musical instrument, grab a bucket of patience and enjoy the process instead of getting hung up on how long it is taking. Famous musicians across the board have spent huge lengths of time practising their instrument, be it a professional violinist or a guitarist in a rock band. To be great at something – anything – requires time, patience and concentration. All extremely good for our brains.
