Learn to Play Piano – 7 Hidden Benefits of Piano Lessons
Do you want to learn to play piano? Or are you planning to send your child for piano lessons? Perhaps you really enjoy piano music and want your child to be able to play your favorite songs. Or perhaps you wish you had learned piano in the past but you were not financially able to do so. Maybe you want your child to become the next Beethoven or Mozart or just to match your neighbor’s child in some way. Whatever it is, this is hopefully a good introduction for your child and yourself into the wonderful world of music. Yet, besides all these various reasons that you want your child (or yourself) to learn to play piano, what are the hidden benefits that playing the instrument can bring to your child or yourself?
1. You Can Develop Better Coordination
By learning to play piano, the pianist will have better hand eye coordination. Music is usually written for two hands, often different to one another, thus training the mind to coordinate movements of the hand and eyes in different directions. This, in turn, helps to sharpen the nervous system and develop dexterity, thought processes and motor skills. Piano music is thus known as “brain food”.
2. You Can Develop Better Concentration
When you or your child learns to play piano, the concentration of the player increases as you will be learning the common language of musicians throughout the world – that of musical notation. This includes all the various notations, rhythms, and hand movements and looking ahead to see what is coming in the next bar. Also, when you get better at piano, you could start learning to memorize certain songs, or get trained in sight reading, chords, and foot pedaling. In a way, this helps to improve your reading, interpretation, critical and creative thinking.
3. You Can Develop Your Self Esteem
It is not surprising that to learn to play piano is hours of hard work and rote practicing. Yet, as you can imagine, showcasing a particular piece at a recital or parties brings with it a sense of accomplishment as most people would be quite impressed that you have learnt this difficult musical work. You can get the chance to meet other like-minded musicians and perform music with them. Thus, the idea of musical practice helps you develop a better positive outlook on most things, builds your confidence, and helps you meet other people too. Pianists have also been shown to be able to handle stress quite well as they are often performing for an audience.
4. Playing Piano Has Been Shown To Encourage Development of Perfect Pitch
It is said that some people are born with perfect pitch, often at times able to sing along to songs they just heard on the radio or the cd at the correct pitch. However, you can encourage the development of perfect pitch in your child by sending them to learn to play piano early in their life. Classical music has been shown to produce positive reactions in the brain, and don’t we all know that Mozart is really good for babies? Thus, start your kids on piano early and perhaps sometime in the future, they might be interested in another musical instrument such as the clarinet or violin. With their background in piano, to learn a new instrument is not as difficult as music theory is universal.
5. Learning to Play Piano Helps Children With Their Studies
Francis Rauscher in 2000 published a study in the journal Early Childhood Research Quarterly that learning to play piano helped children to understand math, science, engineering and spatial reasoning better than their non-musically inclined classmates. For example, most rhythms in music are written in fractional terms, a crotchet is usually one beat, while a quaver is usually half a beat – this helps expose piano playing children to mathematical concepts much earlier than their peers.
6. You Develop An Appreciation For Music
As mentioned before, musical theory is a universal language and translates well across all genres of music, whether it be classical, pop, R&B or rock. You can understand the various parts of music such as the chords, melodies, accompaniments and song modulations that very few people would ever know. Also, to learn to play piano would mean that you would get exposed to all the wonders of classical music of the past written by famous composers like Chopin or Beethoven which receives very little airtime on radios nowadays.
7. Playing The Piano Is Fun
Through it all, playing the piano is actually quite fun as you can get to perform at functions and meet other like minded musical people. The best enjoyment is ultimately when you are skilled enough to write your own songs and add your own lyrics. Most singers do not even have the skill to write their own songs as they do not understand music theory.
In conclusion, there are many benefits to learn to play piano for yourself or for your kids. If you manage to convince yourself on this idea, then, hopefully, let the piano welcome you into a world of musical appreciation and understanding.
Dark Wolf has been learning the piano has a passion for piano playing and learning techniques. He has finished Grade 8 of the ABRSM exams for some time and now plays piano during his leisure time. He made the website http://pianooccasion.net in order to share his piano knowledge with the world. Go to http://pianooccasion.net for free tips, suggestions and beginners guide to playing the piano.
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