The image is a composite of details from the relief in the Palace of Darius which is located in the ancient city Persepolis, today’s Iran. Listen to more Ancient meditation music here: https://songwhip.com/buddhaslounge
Music
Paranoia is in bloom
The PR transmissions will resume
They’ll try to push drugs that keep us all dumbed down
And hope that we will never see the truth around
(So come on)
Another promise, another scene
Another packaged lie to keep us trapped in greed
And all the green belts wrapped around our minds
And endless red tape to keep the truth confined
(So come on)
They will not force us
They will stop degrading us
They will not control us
We will be victorious
(So come on)
Interchanging mind control
Come, let the revolution take its toll
If you could flick the switch and open your third eye
You’d see that we should never be afraid to die
(So come on)
Rise up and take the power back
It’s time the fat cats had a heart attack
You know that their time’s coming to an end
We have to unify and watch our flag ascend
(So come on)
They will not force us
They will stop degrading us
They will not control us
We will be victorious
(So come on)
They will not force us
They will stop degrading us
They will not control us
We will be victorious
(So come on)
Aug 31, 2022
The 2022 VMAs was a non-stop barrage of agenda-pushing and blatant symbolism that simply cannot be ignored. It was a reflection of the highly toxic climate of today’s pop culture, one that has been weaponized for indoctrination. Here’s how Lil Nas X, Nicki Minaj, BLACKPINK, Bad Bunny, Anitta and others were used in this sad spectacle.
Ever since I began analyzing the VMAs back in 2009, I highlighted the fact that MTV’s yearly ceremony is essentially a theatrical performance, complete with recurring actors and an overarching narrative. The goal is to promote specific artists and showcase how they comply with the elite’s agenda by using blatant symbolism.
The 2022 VMAs was no exception. A limited number of actors took part in this play (notably Nicki Minaj, Jack Harlow, and BLACKPINK) as all kinds of globalist-elite-friendly agendas were being promoted to millions of young viewers. And, in 2022, that agenda is simply toxic.
As I witnessed the sheer depravity and absurd hyper-sexualization that permeated this show, my thoughts took on a biblical level. Indeed, on some occasions, words like “Sodom and Gomorrah” popped into my head because, seriously, we’re heading there fast.
The VMAs were not merely about being “sexy”, it was about weird, twisted, unnatural, and exploitative sexualization that’s clearly motivated by malevolent forces. This sexualization is not about “free expression”, it is about the exact opposite. It is about control, submission, and even humiliation. Through symbolism, we understand that the “artists” that are celebrated during these awards are actually slaves of a powerful system that is using them as a weapon for mass indoctrination.
Think I’m exaggerating? Let’s just look at this cursed spectacle and you decide.
Pre-Show Madness
For some reason, the VMAs was hyper-focused on butts. To an absurd level. It’s almost as if the makers of show believed that all of its viewers were toddlers stuck in the anal stage of developement. And I’m not only talking about female butts.
The first performance of the pre-show featured Saucy Santana dressed like a woman and twerking all over the place.
Saucy Satana shakes his booty while wearing one of Beyonce’s outfits.
Also, there was this guy.
The name of the song: Booty. The chorus of the song:
Yeah, I know you like my booty, booty, booty, booty
booty, booty, booty, booty
Booty, booty, booty, booty, booty
Sodom and Gomorrah.
At the end of the pre-show, Dove Cameron performed the song Boyfriend.
Dove Cameron and her female dancers are dressed in masculine clothes.
Here’s the chorus of the song:
I could be a better boyfriend than him
I could do the sh*t that he never did
Up all night, I won’t quit
Thinking I’m gonna steal you from him
I could be such a gentleman
Plus all my clothes would fit
The song is about Dove convincing a woman that she can be a better “boyfriend” to her than her own male boyfriend.
To sum up the Red Carpet show, the first performance featured a bunch of men twerking while dressed as women. The last performance featured a woman dressed as a man and singing about being a “better boyfriend”.
In short, a complete reversal of the sexes. I said above, this is not merely about being sexy, this is about twisting human nature and confusing young viewers.
All of that and the actual VMA’s did not even begin yet.
The Blatant Symbolism of the VMAs
The entire VMAs were rife with obvious symbolism that strongly hinted at one thing: The occult elite controls everything.
Most awards were preceded by an animation depicting a “hand from above” bestowing a gift to those under. It represents the elite handing out an award to the compliant slaves it controls.
As you’ll soon see, nearly every artist at the VMAs performed under a pyramidal structure that gave the entire show a strange, dystopian vibe. The message: The elite owns these slaves. Even up-and-coming artists performed under pyramids.
Conan Grey, a male singer (who was dressed in female clothes) performs under a pyramid. The message: The elite is “incubating” this artist for the future.
The VMAs also managed to convey the fact that being under the elite’s pyramid comes at a cost.
Lil Nas X Humiliation
The first award that was given at the VMAs was followed by a strange scene that might be a classic case of “humiliation ritual”. When Jack Harlow and Lil Nas X won the “Best Collaboration” award, Lil Nas did not want to get up.
Then, Jack Harlow forced Lil Nas to stand up. The rapper was clearly embarrassed as he attempted to hide his privates using his purse (or whatever).
Once on stage to accept the award, Lil Nas said:
“Wow, I’m up here like half-naked.”
While on the stage, Lil Nas X was still clearly embarrassed as he tried to hide from the viewers. This image basically says: Yes, he got an award, but at what cost?
This is what probably happened: Lil Nas was forced to wear this outfit and “they” knew very well that he had to go on stage while wearing it. In numerous previous articles, I stated that Lil Nas was a male Sex Kitten slave of the industry. This forced sexual humiliation is part of the price to pay to be an industry slave.
BLACKPINK
As explained in past articles on this site, K-Pop is 100% part of the occult elite’s agenda. And BLACKPINK has been “chosen” to make it big across the world. The group’s performance at the VMA’s could not have been more obvious.
The performance began with a couple of horns descending from a cloud, in front of a lit pyramidal structure. Satanic occult elite.
Then things get even more obvious.
BLACKPINK literally performs in front of a giant eye inside a triangle which happens to be the favorite symbol of the occult elite.
Yes, I’m talking about this symbol.
The all-seeing eye inside a triangle.
To confirm the fact that BLACKPINK was chosen by the elite, Lisa, a member of the group, went on to win the Best K-POP Video award for her song Lalisa.
Here’s the cover art of the album.
It’s basically a massive one-eye sign.
You comply with the elite, you get shiny things. But at what cost?
As you can see, the elite fully infiltrated K-Pop. And it is doing the same with Latin music.
Latin Music Infiltrated
The 2022 VMAs featured several Latin artists and all of them managed to display complete submission to the occult elite.
J Balvin and Ryan Castro performed the song Nivel Del Perreo next to weird CGI of a girl shaking her butt. Yup, there were lots of butts at the VMAs. More importantly, they performed in front of another version of the eye-in-triangle symbol.
Some might say:
“Triangles do not necessarily mean Illuminati bro.”
I know. But here’s an actual lyric that was rapped by Ryan Castro during this very performance.
“Yo te como el triangulito como Illuminati” (I eat your triangle like Illuminati)
While this line barely makes any sense, it was said in this specific context for a purpose. It confirmed that these triangles you are seeing throughout the show symbolize the elite.
Anitta’s performance confirms this fact.
Anitta’s performance began with her sitting in front of yet another eye inside a triangle.
At one point, Anitta says:
“Did you think I wasn’t gonna shake my ass tonight?”
As said above, the VMA’s were strongly focused on butts. As soon as Anitta talked about “shaking her ass”, this symbolic thing happened.
The “hidden hands” (seen earlier handing out awards) literally open the doors of the pyramid to Anitta.
The message of this scene: Be a Sex Kitten slave and the occult elite will “open the doors” of the industry.
As explained in a recent article, the Brazilian singer Anitta has been hard at work doing the occult elite’s bidding.
Left: Anitta makes a blatant one-eye sign in a picture that was used in a New York Times article promoting her. Right: The cover of her album Version of Me revolves around the concept of MKULTRA alter-personas.
Of course, to confirm that she’s a “chosen one” Anitta won the award of “Best Latin Video”.
Throughout the show, Anitta wore a bright red dress that strategically exposed her left breast.
As explained in my very first article about the VMAs, red is the color of sacrifice and initiation. Furthermore, initiation rituals in Freemasonry require their candidates to walk around with their left breast exposed.
A Masonic initiate with his left breast exposed.
Bad Bunny is another Latin artist who was awarded at the VMAs. As seen in previous articles on this site, everything he does is in full compliance of the elite’s agenda.
Bad Bunny constantly wears dresses in photoshoots because he has to push the all-important gender-blurring and demasculinization agenda.
Bad Bunny won the Artist of the Year award, which is pretty big. However, he had to do something first.
During his performance, Bad Bunny kissed one of his male dancers.
Bad Bunny is not gay. He has a girlfriend and everything. During an interview with the LA Times, he stated:
“At the end of the day, I don’t know if in 20 years I will like a man. One never knows in life. But at the moment I am heterosexual and I like women.”
So why did he kiss a man? Because he had to. He’s a slave and he had to comply with the agenda. It’s about using sexuality for submission, compliance and humiliation.
Sure, he won a trophy. But at what cost?
Nicki Minaj Extravagenza
Nicki Minaj was all over the place at the 2022 VMAs. She was a host, she won the Video Vanguard Award and she performed for like 13 minutes. And, once again, the thing was rife with symbolism regarding her status as an industry slave.
Minaj’s entire performance revolved around the concept of her being a Barbie doll aka an MK slave.
In Monarch mind control, MK slaves are submitted to trauma such as electroshock therapy to cause dissociation which facilitates the creation of new programmable alter-persona. This is exactly what happens to Nicki during her performance.
Her set begins with her rapping in a rather natural, normal way, with some introspective lyrics. She’s her natural self. Then, she starts spazzing out.
Lights flash and Nicki flails around as if she was being electroshocked.
Lightning bolts further conveyed the concept of Nicki being electroshocked.
After the electroshock, her voice and demeanor change. Her alter-persona is now on stage.
While performing the song Monster, Nicki tortures a woman for no particular reason. MK slaves are sometimes used to torture and kill other slaves.
Like other artists at the VMAs, Nicki performed at the bottom of the pyramid. Also, notice the Masonic checkerboard pattern floor.
A Masonic clock containing the symbolism of the Blue Lodge. See any similarities with the screenshot above?
After the performance, fans of Nicki Minaj (called Barbs) paid tribute to her. It was ridiculous. One woman said:
“Queen. You taught me to always put myself first and be completely unapologetic about it.”
Huh, qUeEn … that just doesn’t sound right. Isn’t ALWAYS putting yourself first the literal definition of being selfish? It’s also the main tenet of the Church of Satan but that’s none of my business.
Then, a guy says (while nearly crying):
“You’ve always been my inspiration for strength and confidence. You’re literally the reason that I’m alive”.
Really? Nicki Minaj is the reason you’re alive? How? What exactly did she do? Was it when she supported her brother who was sentenced 25 to life for child rape? Or when she supported Drake, the child groomer? Or her husband who was arrested for failing to register as a sex offender? Or the fact that she named one of her alter-egos after child rapist Roman Polanski?
Then, another Barb says:
“Her music is everything. We owe her everything. She is everything, OK?”
We owe her everything? How?
Then, after being praised by her fans as the best person on Earth, Nicki literally begins her acceptance speech by yelling at her assistant in the crowd because he didn’t give her her phone. Seriously, you can’t make this up.
The BS and the hypocrisy that was on display at the VMAs were nothing short of phenomenal.
Winning … and Whining
At one point, Bebe Rexha comes out to present the “Video for Good” award. She says:
“The nominees for Video for Good push us to be better, to be ourselves, and to be nicer to each other.”
Then, Lizzo wins and she comes up looking like this.
This is exactly the first word of the acceptance speech by this person who is “pushing us to be better”.
“B***********tch!”
So inspirational. She really is making us better.
Then, she ranted about “laws that are oppressing us”. Of course, she wasn’t talking about actual laws that are oppressing us but about abortions (because the elite is obsessed with killing babies). Then, Lizzo addressed comedian Aries Spears who dared to make jokes about her.
Indeed, Spears said that he couldn’t get past the fact that Lizzo “looks like the sh*t emoji” and that she was “built like a plate of mashed potatoes”. Lizzo said:
“And now for the b*tches that had something to say about me in the press. (…) B*tch I’m winning ho!”.
So, instead of ignoring the jokes and saying something meaningful, she just used her platform to yell obscenities on the mic. It’s exactly like the ridiculous Nicki Minaj situation described above.
Here’s a little message for Lizzo: You’re only winning because they want you to. When they’re done using you to push agendas, you’ll basically be 
to them.
Then, the hypocrisy mixed with virtue signaling continued.
Later in the show, Billy Eichner came out and he was very angry.
Billy was there to promote the movies Bros. He said:
“Bros is making history as the first gay romcom ever made by a major studio and the first where every role is played by an openly LGBTQ actor”.
Hold on, Billy. If EVERY role is played by LGBTQ actors, isn’t that the exact opposite of being “inclusive”? Isn’t that the opposite of sexual diversity?
Then, Billy actually guilts people into watching the movie.
“I need all of you in theaters because we need to show all the homophobes like Clarence Thomas and all the homophobes on the Supreme Court that we want gay love stories”.
Wow. I didn’t realize that the “homophobes of the Supreme Court” banned gay love stories.
Eminem and Snoop in the Metaverse
A few months ago, I analyzed Mark Zuckerberg’s pathetic attempt at making the Metaverse cool to young people with a creepy and disturbing ad. Well, they’re at it again. This time, they’ve recruited Eminem and Snoop Dogg to promote this dystopian virtual reality world that is controlled by mega-tech corporations.
The performance begins with Snoop smoking a gigantic joint and Eminem saying that it’s getting him high.
Then, the marijunana smoke transports them to the Metaverse.
Yes, they’re equating being in the Metaverse with being high. That’s how low they’re willing to go to sell the Metaverse to young people.
Fake, Metaverse versions of Snoop and Eminem perform in “trippy” places such as this place populated with horned beings.
Snoop and Eminem probably got paid a whole lot to promote the Metaverse in such a pathetic matter. I hope it was worth it because it was definitely a low point in their careers.
In Conclusion
The 2022 VMA show was a non-stop barrage of toxic messages and occult symbolism that are directly sponsored by the global elite. This sad spectacle was a blatant proof of how popular culture is now used to not only indoctrinate the masses, but to actually confuse and demoralize them.
For years, I’ve been highlighting the gender-blurring agenda that’s permeating societies across the world. The VMAs is a perfect reflection of the absurdity of this agenda. Every single year, the VMAs push this agenda a little further, knowing very well that those who dare mention anything about it would be shut down as “transphobic”. Now, it has come to the point that most men at the VMAs are overtly feminine.
What will it take for people to realize that none of this is organic? That it is all part of a sick agenda? Maybe having all artists perform under a literal Illuminati pyramid would do it? Hold on, that’s exactly what they did.
Nobody in mass media talked about any of this. They were too focused on the butts.
The 2022 VMAs summed up in one picture.
Big life changes are on the way, who am I to know where it will go?
I wrote this song, living on the royalties!
(OK, I had nothing to do with the creation of this song. I wish I had.)
This is important for musicians, others, not so much. Most civilians, people who don’t know where music comes from, don’t care, that is why they should try the song underneath this one.
They call it Facebook jail. Just because I have different opinions. It’s making me rethink everything. I really wish we had a real Facebook, the kind that would be aimed at humanity instead of corporate profits. I am really considering dropping out of FB, but it’s complicated. That’s how I communicate with my less savvy internet friends, family, etc.
Anyway, while I am pondering let me share what I would be posting in one of my pages on FB. Yeah, it took a while but a music page was created that attracts people from all over the world. That was the idea. Then, people started sharing ideas amongst themselves. The big hammer came down. If anyone speaks of freedom of speech in North America I will puke.
It would be nice if we could really speak our minds with no interference, agree? Any adult out there thinks we need religion, government, others, to regulate ourselves? Look at history, the human animal does what it needs, what its instinct wants. In that sense, I understand Crowley and Marylin Manson. All we have is a bunch of us human animals trying to stop and think, and figure out, what kind of world we want and need.
My name is Luis and I mean it from the heart.
Hey, can anyone share this tune on my page on Facebook for me? It’s called Planet Evolution Music, and tell my people I love and miss them, and I will never give up.
I trained for seven years with a monk in Northern Tibet when I was younger.
No, it did not happen. OK. The voices in the head are back.
The truth? After all I have seen I still don’t understand it all, so like the Dalai said, I will stick with kindness. Am I a fool to cry sometimes?
“Presently, the fabric that holds a society together has shredded in the wind. Everyone has their own facts, their own private Idaho stored in their expensive cellular phones. The earbuds are in, the feedback loops are locked, and the Frappuccino’s are flowing freely. Social media provides the highway straight back to Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. The restless natives react to digital shadows on the wall, reduced to fear, hate, and superstition…”
Source
Dec 6 2018
Following the band’s Rock Hall nomination, founder Gerald Casale reflects on its dystopian legacy in the age of Trump.
Forty-eight years ago, on May 4, 1970, as a member of SDS (Students for a Democratic Society), I was front and center being fired on by my fellow Americans in the Ohio National Guard at Kent State University, as we peacefully protested President Nixon’s expansion of the cancerously unpopular Vietnam War into Cambodia without an act of Congress. I was lucky and dodged the bullet, both literally and figuratively, but four students were killed, and nine more were seriously wounded by the armed, mostly teenaged, National Guard troops. Two of the four students killed, Alison Krause and Jeffery Miller, were close acquaintances of mine. Less than a year earlier, as an Admissions/Curriculum counselor to incoming students, I had admitted them to the Honors College program.
May 4 changed my life, and I truly believe Devo would not exist without that horror. It made me realize that all the Quasar color TVs, Swanson TV dinners, Corvettes, and sofa beds in the world didn’t mean we were actually making progress. It meant the future could be not only as barbaric as the past, but that it most likely would be. The dystopian novels 1984, Animal Farm, and Brave New World suddenly seemed less like cautionary tales about the encroaching fusion of technological advances with the centralized, authoritarian power of the state, and more like subversive road maps to condition the intelligentsia for what was to come.
As I started working with my Kent State poet friend, Bob Lewis, a philosophy emerged, fueled by the revelations that linear progress in a consumer society was a lie. Things were not getting better. There were no flying cars and domed cities, as promised in Popular Science; rather, there was a dumbing down of the population engineered by right-wing politicians, televangelists, and Madison Avenue. I called what we saw “De-evolution,” based upon the tendency toward entropy across all human endeavors. Borrowing the tactics of the Mad Men-era of our childhood, we shortened the name of the idea to the marketing-friendly “Devo.” We were not left-wing politicos. We were more informed by Jungian principles of duality in human nature, and we realized human flaws spread out across the political spectrum. Hence: “We’re All Devo,” an idea from which we did not exempt ourselves.
Then, and in the decades to follow, we witnessed an America where the capacity for critical thought and reasoning were eroding fast. People mindlessly repeating slogans from political propaganda and ad campaigns: “America, Love It or leave It”; “Don’t Ask Why, Drink Bud Dry”; “You’ve Come A Long Way, Baby”; even risk-free, feel-good slogans like “Give Peace a Chance.” Here was an emerging Corporate Feudal State. You were either inside the draw bridge at night, or outside with the gnashing of teeth.
Rebellion appeared hopelessly obsolete. If the message wasn’t sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll, there could be hell to pay. More and more, it seemed like the only real threat to consumer society at our disposal was meaning: turning sloganeering on its head for sarcastic or subversive means, and making people notice that they were being moved and manipulated by marketing, not by well-meaning friends disguised as mom-and-pop. And so creative subversion seemed the only viable course of action. We mixed our outrage with equal parts satire and dark humor. What else could a poor boy do?
Prior to the resignation of the nefarious Richard M. Nixon, I partnered with a new collaborator, Mark Mothersbaugh, and with his musical prowess we found the sonic alchemy for the Devo aesthetic. We formed a band of brothers around the philosophy of Devolution, only to be proven all too right.
Presently, the fabric that holds a society together has shredded in the wind. Everyone has their own facts, their own private Idaho stored in their expensive cellular phones. The earbuds are in, the feedback loops are locked, and the Frappuccino’s are flowing freely. Social media provides the highway straight back to Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. The restless natives react to digital shadows on the wall, reduced to fear, hate, and superstition. There are climate change deniers, and there are even more who think that the climate is being maliciously manipulated by corporate conglomerates owned by the Central Bank to achieve global control of resources and wealth. If only that James Bond-style fantasy were true, I would be much more excited about the future, which I fear is more of a slow-death conspiracy of dunces like in Mike Judge’s movie, Idiocracy, the movie Devo should have made.
We are drowning in a devolved, WWF Smackdown-style world, with warring, huckster TV pundits from “The Left” and “The Right” distracting the clueless TV viewership while our vile, venal Mobster-in-Chief (who makes Idiocracy’s Macho Camacho look fit for office) and his corrupt minions rob the nation’s coffers in a shamelessly cruel, Grab-‘Em-By-The-Pussy Kleptocracy. They reflect the prevailing mentality of the electorate. It’s as if Christopher Nolan wrote the script for America, where Trump is the Joker handing out Cabinet positions to The Suicide Squad: Hey, Betsy! You hate public education? How’d you like to run the Department of Education? Scott, you don’t give a shit about poisoning the environment for your kids and grandkids, right? Here’s your new office, Pal. Don’t forget that soundproof phone booth!
The rise of authoritarian leadership around the globe, fed by ill-informed populism, is well-documented at this point. And with it, we see the ugly specter of increased racism and anti-Semitism. It’s open season on those who gladly vote against their own self-interests. The exponential increase in suffering for more and more of the population is heartbreaking to see. “Freedom of choice is what you got / Freedom from choice is what you want,” those Devo clowns said in 1980.
So, let us not talk falsely now; the hour is getting late. Perhaps the reason Devo was even nominated after 15 years of eligibility is because Western society seems locked in a death wish. Devo doesn’t skew so outside the box anymore. Maybe people are a bit nostalgic for our DIY originality and substance. We were the canaries in the coalmine warning our fans and foes of things to come in the guise of the Court Jester, examples of conformity in extremis in order to warn against conformity. We were certainly not the one-hit wonders the dismissive rock press likes to say we were. We have always been the Rodney Dangerfields of Rock ‘N’ Roll. We were polarizing because we did not “play ball” with the sex, drugs, rock ‘n’ roll messaging dictum.
But today Devo is merely the house band on the Titanic. With three generations of fans, 10 studio albums, five live albums, scores of singles, scores of music videos (a format which we pioneered), and eight world tours committed to history since our 1978 debut record, Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo, we’ve all too chillingly stood the test of time. 2020 will be the 40th anniversary of our Freedom of Choice record. Don’t be surprised to see us on tour then in our iconic, red Energy Domes, careening toward the latest Presidential election/selection. Speaking truth to power is a never-ending battle. In the best-case scenario, we avoid sinking into the abyss and, as a society, scratch ourselves back to square one.
Is there any question that De-evolution is real?
Devo founder Gerald Casale is a director, and songwriter based in Los Angeles. Vote for Devo in the Rock Hall’s Fan Vote here.
There is no glee or pleasure in watching the USA unravel but karmic consequences are at play. Millions are about to meet their maker.
7 years ago, I posted Cookiewaits’s video mashup of Cookie Monster performing Tom Waits’s “God’s Away on Business,” but I somehow missed that Cookiewaits followed it up the next year with this brilliant mashup for “Hell Broke Luce,” which is something of a favorite around these parts. If that’s your bag, don’t miss the Sesame Street gang performing the Beasties’ “Sabotage.” (Thanks, Richard Callaghan!)
By Roxane, Paris 2016.
theconversation.com
Professor, University of British Columbia
Assistant Professor, University of British Columbia
July 1, 2019
What does maturing mean after elementary school? Here’s one thing it shouldn’t mean: dropping music at school.
My colleagues and I at the University of British Columbia studied over 110,000 public school students. We learned that students involved in extended music engagement (between grades 8 – 12) do one full year better academically than non-music peers, particularly when engaged in instrumental music sustained over years of schooling. Also, music achievement predicts academic achievement in math, science and English.
Music matters for its own sake, but also because, as our study shows, music engagement sustained from childhood into adolescence – particularly instrumental music that begins in elementary school – is significantly related to better high school achievement.
Study: Rich data
Thanks to rich educational and socio-economic data capturing the full population of B.C. public school students for several cohorts, we had an unprecedented opportunity to examine how student participation in music and music achievement predicted and related to provincial examination scores in high school English, math and science subjects. We looked at scores from provincial testing from Grade 10 math, science and English as well as Grade 12 English in relationship to students’ participation in music.
In our study, we counted both the number of high school courses taken, as well as student high school involvement and grades in graduation program music courses (concert band, jazz band, orchestra, piano and choir) taken across public high school years (Grades 8-12).
Based on previous research we inferred that music involvement that continued up to Grade 12 would be associated with (and predict) higher high school grades in mathematics, science and English. We expected instrumental music would have a more pronounced positive impact than vocal music.
We found that this is true, even when we take into account the following four factors: children’s prior elementary school educational achievement in numeracy and literacy, as captured by the B.C. Foundation Skills Assessment Grade 7 examination; gender; socioeconomic background (as gauged by the student’s home neighbourhood); linguistic diversity, captured by language spoken in the home.
We used a statistical regression model and adjusted our analyses to control for those four factors. We did this to demonstrate that these factors were not key determinants in musical or academic achievement and to address the problem of what researchers call confounding — unaccounted-for factors that might lead to incorrect findings.
While we are not yet able to infer causality — that music causes students to be smarter or improve their grades — we were able to identify a predictive relationship between music achievement and academic achievement, and demonstrate that more music engagement can be better for overall learning.
Sustained engagement
A handful of experiments have found that students randomly assigned to music training outperform those assigned to non-music groups.
But music is an inherently complex phenomenon — there are many ways to make and engage with music. Many other studies have examined music participation but they didn’t take into account different types of music making such as instrumental music, vocal music, or other forms and amounts of engagement.
Also, several earlier studies have been based on small, unrepresentative samples or considered only brief exposure to music training — whereas a central claim substantiated by our study underscores the academic achievement benefits from sustained engagement in music training over several years.
Increased cognitive capacity
Students in the present study who were highly engaged in instrumental music were, on average, over one year ahead in their math, English and science skills, compared to those peers not engaged in school music.
We say one year ahead because the math, science and English grades that music-engaged students obtained in Grade 10 could place them a full year ahead in their curricular studies. In practical terms, the effect sizes we measured when comparing adolescents in the very highly engaged instrumental music group with the no music group (even after adjustment) were of a magnitude similar to or greater than the average annual gains in reading, science and math that are seen during the high school years in the U.S. context
We attribute these strong associations between music engagement and academic achievement to a combination of increased cognitive capacity. In the brain, instrumental music changes the structure and function of the Heschl’s gyrus (HG) and the specific area which contains it, the auditory cortex (AC).
To make music in upper secondary grade levels, students need to go beyond simple button pushing and the mechanical playing of instruments. Students need to “think music” through a process known as audiation. Audiation is the ability to compare what was heard in the immediate past in music listening with the present, and to connect what was heard with our expectations of what might come next. Music audiation ability is significantly correlated to the structure and function of the Heschl’s gyrus in the auditory cortex.
We do not yet fully understand the mechanisms of how music learning transfers to other developmental areas, but our work and numerous studies suggest that extended, engagement with music learning (particularly instrumental music) enhances cognitive mechanisms.
It is also likely that prolonged and more music engagement results in higher motivation and self-efficacy, executive functions and a positive impact on emotional development and self esteem.
The patterns of our findings suggest that music participation – especially in instrumental music, and multiple years of engagement over time – confers cognitive benefits in the form of tangible differences in many aspects of academic learning.
Significant associations
When focusing solely on learners who took instrumental music, additional important and theoretically plausible findings are revealed — namely that there is a “dose-response” type relationship. This means that higher levels of engagement (more classes) in music are related to incrementally higher exam scores. We also see significant, predictive relationships between higher grades in instrumental music courses and higher exam scores.
Music may not make you smarter, but we now know that music engagement sustained from childhood into adolescence — and more of it, especially instrumental music — may lead to doing better in high school.
An emphasis on numeracy and literacy at the cost of other areas of learning, particularly music, should not be acceptable in our public schools.
Let the band play on!
Scott Emerson contributed to this study’s literature review and statistical analyses.
Tales from the Conspiratum 