Are guitarists brains different?

Sure, we've all suspected it for years, but now a study has pretty much confirmed it: Guitarists' brains are different from everyone else's. In a 2012 study conducted in Berlin, researchers scanned the brains of 12 pairs of guitarists, all of whom were asked to play the same piece of music.
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Does playing guitar change your brain?

Studies show that playing the guitar improves the grey matter in the brain resulting in improved memory power. Additionally, there is less decline in memory power with age. This is proven true by the fact that you have to memorize chords and patterns which act as a good workout for your brain.
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Is a musicians brain different?

Musicians have more connected brains than non-musicians

The brains of musicians have stronger structural and functional connections compared to those of non-musicians, regardless of innate pitch ability, according to new research from JNeurosci. Years of musical training shape the brain in dramatic ways.
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Are guitar players intelligent?

The scans revealed the guitarists were able to switch to the creative left area of the brain and at the same time deactivate the rational right area of the brain. This means that a skilled, well practiced guitar player is capable of mind control.
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How do musicians brains work differently?

Music-making engages both halves of the brain equally. By stimulating the left brain, which is the more mathematical, calculating and syntactic hemisphere, and the right, which is the more creative, musicians build a strong corpus callosum, which acts as a neural bridge between the two hemispheres.
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Are the Brains of Musicians Physically Different?



Are musicians smarter?

The researchers also found that, overall, the musicians had higher IQ scores than the non-musicians, supporting recent studies that intensive musical training is associated with an elevated IQ score. The research was partially supported by a Vanderbilt University Discovery Grant.
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Do musicians have healthier brains?

Music training may promote healthy aging of the brain.

Studies show that musicians have an advantage in maintaining their cognitive abilities during the aging process. This includes tasks that involve executive functioning and short-term memory. Older musicians have other advantages as well.
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Why are guitarists so weird?

Guitar players make funny faces when performing live because they are fully focused and committed to the sounds they are producing. This level of concentration can cause the face muscles to tighten or conform because of our human instinctual reflex to express how we feel through our facial expressions.
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How do guitarists think?

According to policymic.com, this research makes it clear that guitarists are spiritual, intuitive people. This sort of intuitive thinking runs all the way to how guitarists learn.
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Does playing guitar increase your IQ?

That's right -- playing music significantly improves brain functioning, and can raise your IQ by seven or more points.
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Do musicians hear differently?

Musicians Hear Better Musicians don't have better ears than the rest of us, but several new studies find that musical training can improve hearing. The musically trained brain can distinguish between subtle pitch and tonal differences in sound that many of us cannot.
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Why do musicians have better memory?

Specifically, they excel at “chunking” — breaking large groups of information into smaller pieces that are easier to recall. “Musicians are masters at chunking,” says Helding, author of The Musician's Mind: Teaching Learning, and Performance in the Age of Brain Science. “They're not thinking of individual notes.
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Are musicians brains wired differently?

According to neurologist Oliver Sacks, author of Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain, musicians' brains differ from those of the general population in a number of ways, including having a stronger connection between the left and right sides of the brain (from an NPR interview):
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Is playing guitar addictive?

Like high-performance cars or class A drugs, guitars are an addiction that is practically impossible to shake. GAS* is a very real, very troubling part of being a guitarist.
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Is guitar left or right brain?

2. Guitar Improves Cognitive Functions. All of that stimulation that occurs while you play guitar includes the region of the brain that links the right and left halves. Due to this, you are doing more than using the more creative-oriented right-half of your brain.
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What are the cons of playing guitar?

The 2 Cons of Learning the Guitar
  • Guitars Can be Expensive. Guitars are an expensive instrument, and if you're wanting to start playing, you'll likely have to set a few hundred dollars aside to get a decent starter guitar. ...
  • Learning the Guitar Takes Time and Patience. Learning the guitar doesn't happen overnight.
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What are the side effects of playing guitar?

The 10 worst things about playing the guitar
  • "Oh, you play guitar? Cool!"
  • Your fingers will know unimaginable pain.
  • People who read tabs instead of actual music.
  • Stretching.
  • Your footstool could collapse at any moment.
  • Creepy nails.
  • Classical guitarists are naturally tame beasts.
  • Tuning up takes forever.
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Why playing the guitar is a gift?

We see playing guitar as a form of mindful escapism, a way to create space between an individual and their busy mind. Guitar-playing is beneficial to your overall well-being and mental health in other ways, too, including helping you develop a greater sense of personal achievement.
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Are guitarists good with their fingers?

1. They're damn good with their fingers. Guitarists, violinists, guitar players and, yes, DJs all use their hands as part of their job. All that concentration certainly makes for a guy who knows how to use his fingers to their utmost potential.
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Why do guitarists face each other?

Why do guitarists put their guitars facing each other when playing sometimes? It gives you a visual of where the other guitar players fingers are on the neck. Letting you know what key they are in and what chords they are playing by the locations of the dots on the neck so you or they can follow along easier.
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Why do guitarists move their mouths?

I tend to just tap my feet when i play guitar.. When using a wah, I tend to move my mouth to how I'm hearing the sound in my head, so I hopefully match my foot movements to what I'm hearing in my head. If that makes any sense...? I move my mouth, but the only reason I know is because people have commented on it.
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Are musicians less likely to get Alzheimer's?

A twin study reported that musicians were 64% less likely to develop mild cognitive impairment or dementia, after additionally adjusting for sex, education and physical activity. A meta-analysis of two cohort studies found a 59% reduction in the risk of developing dementia within the study follow up.
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Do artists have bigger brains?

Artists have structurally different brains compared with non-artists, a study has found. Participants' brain scans revealed that artists had increased neural matter in areas relating to fine motor movements and visual imagery.
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Do musicians have bigger brains?

Musicians have bigger and more sensitive brains than people who do not play instruments, scientists revealed yesterday. Musicians have bigger and more sensitive brains than people who do not play instruments, scientists revealed yesterday.
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