Alzheimer’s: how music keeps the brain young, even in old age

Guitar, violin, piano. Or whatever you prefer – including percussion. If you want to keep your brain young, start playing a musical instrument. Even if you’re not exactly a youngster and may well have passed the 70-year mark, give this simple (and enjoyable) preventative measure a go, which involves practising the seven notes. This advice comes from a four-year study carried out in Japan, which reveals that those who continue to practise on the stave show, on average, better memory performance and even experience a slower rate of brain atrophy compared to those who stop practising in old age. In particular, according to the study, the greatest benefits are seen in the regions of the brain associated with memory and learning. This ‘solution’ for healthy ageing comes from original research carried out by experts at Kyoto University, led by Kaoru Sekiyama, and published in *Imaging Neuroscience*.

Generally speaking, as we get older, there are two areas of the brain that tend to shrink and become less active: these are the putamen (which is essential not only for movement but also for learning processes) and the cerebellum. However, neuroscience has also revealed another distinctive feature of these areas of the nervous system: they are particularly responsive to learning to play a musical instrument. This observation formed the basis for the working hypothesis of the researchers, who set out to assess what happens when people begin playing a musical instrument in later life. The study examined participants from a previous project which had shown that older adults who had practised a musical instrument for the first time for just four months exhibited improvements in memory performance and putamen function. However, the aim was to understand whether and how these benefits might be sustained in the long term. In the new study, following an initial four-month training period (average age 73), around half continued to play their instrument for more than three years, whilst the others stopped and took up other hobbies. Four years after the initial assessment, the effects of the intervention were studied using magnetic resonance imaging (focusing in particular on the putamen and the cerebellum) and cognitive tests.

Music protects. Even if you start playing late in life. Those who had given up playing an instrument showed a decline in verbal working memory and a reduction in the volume of grey matter in the right putamen, compared with those who had continued to play. Not only that: greater activity was also observed across wider areas of both cerebellums in participants who continued to play compared with those who had stopped. ““We were surprised to discover that the effects on the brains of older people who start and continue to play an instrument are also concentrated in these two brain areas, and that this represents an effective way of preventing age-related cognitive decline,” commented Sekiyama in a statement from the Japanese university –”. According to the expert, the research not only highlights how much and in what ways music can aid brain function even in old age, but also suggests that playing an instrument could prove to be a sort of “substitute” for those with impairments that prevent them from engaging in regular physical activity. In the presence of these or other problems linked to chronic pain, therefore, turning to music could still help counteract brain ageing.

For those who do not wish to devote themselves to studying music, however, simply listening to a variety of melodies and singing could also provide significant preventive benefits. This is according to research carried out some time ago by experts at the University of Helsinki and published in the *Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease*. The study examined 89 pairs of patients with moderate or severe dementia and their carers, demonstrating that whilst singing can prove to be a valuable therapeutic aid in the early stages of the condition, as dementia progresses, listening to music is certainly beneficial, even if the patient does not participate directly. It should be noted that there are no specific preferences in terms of musical styles: in short, it does not matter what the person used to listen to before the onset of the condition that ‘clouds’ their memories. In summary: listening to music can improve overall cognitive function in patients with moderate (and therefore more severe) dementia, including those in care homes, and in non-Alzheimer’s patients. Above all, however, the research confirms that leisure activities (including listening to music) act as a protective factor against Alzheimer’s disease. Moreover, the same Finnish researchers, in a study published in *The Gerontologist*, had already demonstrated that music – whether sung or listened to – can improve cognitive functions (short-term and recall memory, attention, orientation) and mood. So let’s focus on the tunes we like best to keep our memory sharp. Here’s one final ‘gem’ that might help: in some great musicians, the angular gyrus of the right hemisphere (a specific area of the nervous system) is more highly developed than in the rest of the population. The reason? Repeated musical stimulation and the flow of notes have provided a sort of ‘training’ for the neurons, which have consequently specialised, making it easier to recall a harmony.