Learning to play a musical instrument may protect the brain from age-related decline, according to new research from Canada and China.
The study, published in PLOS Biology, found that older adults with decades of music practice performed better at understanding speech in noisy environments than non-musicians of the same age. Their brain activity patterns also looked more like those of younger people.
Researchers said this effect stems from building up “cognitive reserve”—a kind of backup system that helps the brain work more efficiently, even as it ages.
“Just like a well-tuned instrument doesn’t need to be played louder to be heard, the brains of older musicians stay finely tuned thanks to years of training,” explained Dr. Yi Du of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
The team studied 25 older musicians, with an average age of 65, who had been playing instruments for at least 32 years, alongside 25 non-musicians of the same age and two dozen younger adults. Participants listened to syllables such as “ba” and “da” against loud background noise while researchers tracked brain activity using fMRI scans.
Older musicians were better at identifying the syllables than non-musicians, especially in moderately noisy settings. While younger adults still outperformed them overall, the musicians retained sharper skills than their peers.
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The scans revealed that non-musicians showed increased brain activity in the auditory dorsal stream, indicating they were working harder to compensate for age-related declines. Musicians, by contrast, showed less strain in those areas and brain activity that more closely resembled younger participants.
Importantly, these changes reflected natural aging rather than diseases like Alzheimer’s. Researchers noted that practicing for around 12 hours per week—regardless of skill level—was enough to strengthen neural connections between areas involved in hearing, movement, and speech.
The findings suggest that music training could form the basis of new therapies to maintain brain health in older adults. A second study from Kyoto University supports this, showing seniors who learned an instrument in their 70s scored better on memory tests four years later.
Together, the research indicates it may never be too late to pick up an instrument—and that doing so could keep both mind and music sharp well into old age.