6 Health Benefits of Composing
Music has many positive health benefits, whether we are listening or playing. You're probably aware of some of these benefits already.
For example, music has been used to help people who suffer pain, stroke, anxiety, Parkinson’s, dementia, and depression, to mention a few. Isn't that amazing!
But did you know that composing music has its own particular set of health benefits?
A study done in 2015 observed the brains of people who composed music and here's what they found:
Composing music stimulates your anterior cingulate cortex, helping you with:
Benefit 1: Emotional processing
- When you compose music, you are attempting to communicate your emotions through the vehicle of music. That involves a very mysterious and yet intricate connection between our feelings and sound. I can tell you from experience that composing music is a wonderful emotional outlet, very different from playing pieces by other composers.
How could that help you in your day-to-day life?
- What would it be like if your emotions were more carefully regulated?
- How much better would your relationships with family and friends be?
- What would it feel like to cut out negative emotions and have positive emotions flourish in your daily life?
Benefit 2: Attention Span
- Composing music requires a huge attention span, as you must carefully consider every detail - form, rhythm, phrase structure, harmonies, etc. - and concentrate on crafting each detail to maximum refinement.
From my experience composing, it's a very different kind of concentration than practicing. It's much more all-encomapssing; physical, mental and emotional. It's like playing chess and telling a very personal story at the same time.
How could that help you in your day-to-day life?
- How much better would you listen to your spouse, children, friends, family, etc.?
- Could the quality of your work at your job improve drastically? Maybe you can get much more work done in less time?
- How much more could you learn and absorb with a better attention span? (I've found from teaching that a good attention span or ability to concentrate is one of the big keys from improving a guitarist's playing).
Benefit 3: Decision making
- You have to eventually come to a decision when you compose. Otherwise, you'll feel stuck or get writer's block. Sometimes it's hard to make a decision, as you have to choose between things of close or equal merit.
This is quite similar to playing and interpretation. You have to come to a decision about your fingering, dynamics, etc. at some point or else your interpretation will be unconvincing. But in composing, the consequence (I would argue) are much greater. The decisions you make can totally reshape the piece, or give different sections a totally different effect. For example, change the texture from chordal to arpeggiated and you'll wind up with a totally different sound.
How could that help you in your day-to-day life?
- Decision making is important, especially when it comes to the big ones. What was the last big decision you made and were you happy with it? If not, what could you have done differently to make the outcome better?
- Even in the small day-to-day things, decision making is crucial. For example, today I have decided to write this email to you! What are the consequences of your everyday decisions? Do they help transform the lives of others for the better? Do they have a long lasting impact on your family, friends, neighborhood, community, etc.?
Composing music stimulates your default mode network, helping you with:
Benefit 4: Remembering the past
- Composing allows us to process our memories into a positive and beautiful channel. How fitting that Julie, a guitarist who took my composition course, wrote her piece titled 'Remembering' (click here to listen)
How could that help you in your day-to-day life?
- Do you have any positive memories that you want to cherish for life? Turn those memories into a piece! Or, do you have any negative memories that you want to come to terms with? Write a piece and perhaps that will help you resolve (quite literally like how music resolves!) those memories.
Benefit 5: Planning for the future
- Composition requires planning, otherwise it just drifts into an abyss. Each student I've helped compose has used a plan inspired from a piece they love to play. Sometimes they might depart a bit from the plan, but generally it helps keep everything structured and organized. I've shown you various plans or templates you can use - the last one was inspired by a Chopin Prelude (click here).
How could that help you in your day-to-day life?
- As I've gotten older and now have two children, I realize the critical need to plan. Each day needs to be planned, otherwise it will be a mess!
- Now that we're approaching a New Year, you might be planning a New Year's Resolution. That's a mild form of planning that many people don't stick to for the whole year. Planning needs to be a habit, done regularly and formed by discipline. Composing helps you make a discipline of planning, as you quickly find out how difficult it is to write a piece of integrity without the foundations of a plan.
Benefit 6: Story Comprehension
- An important part of the planning process when composing is the story your piece is telling. One of the most important questions that all composers ask: How does a piece display comprehension (unity) and a musical story (variety) at once? Those are the types of things you learn with me if you take my online composition course.
How could that help you in your day-to-day life?
- Learning is often most powerful when associated with stories. Build up this skill and you can improve your ability to retain and absorb knowledge.
- Storytelling can help make you more engaging with your family, friends and colleagues. A great story is a meaningful way to communicate with people - children love a great story and will sit still and attentive for ages when engaged by one.
Composing is much more than just trying to write a perfect piece.
It's more all-encompassing than playing music by other composers and has multiple health benefits that can affect many aspects of your life for the better.