<p>Just read an interesting story about a not-well-known benefit of musical training.</p>
<p>Taking</a> Up Music So You Can Hear : Northwestern University Newscenter</p>
<p>Interesting article. I really enjoy reading about stuff like this, although it seems to me that a person who is already born with natural tendencies to discriminate sound (like all of our kids) might be more likely to be interested in musical training. The old nature vs nurture question.</p>
<p>I note the average age of the participants was 23. I am a bit older than that (!) and have not noticed that my recent interest in classical music, especially trying to pick out the clarinets, has helped my speech discrimination, unfortunately. (too much rock and roll).</p>
<p>Did I say that too loudly? (insert smiley face here)</p>
<p>This is an interesting article but I always get frustrated reading things like this as my D is 100% deaf in one ear and is starting a double major in music ed and music performance (she is a classical percussionist). If most of these studies looked at people who are already living through it they could learn a lot more. My D has always had to work at sound discrimination and the ability to filter sounds with one ear only. She is so natural at it that there have been times that we almost forget she is partially deaf. Teachers have given her a hard time because in a noisy class room she will turn her head slightly in order to focus her good ear on the teacher and thereby pick out the voice over noise. She has had numerous confrontations when the teachers accuse her of not paying attention. Even though she has been identified the teachers forget because she compensates so well but they do not realize that they embarrass her in front a many fellow students who do not even know. I will end my comments here because this could turn into my own soap box and it was not meant to be.</p>