Older adults participating in group keyboard lessons were found to have significantly increased levels of human growth hormone (HGH), according to a recent study. HGH, whose secretion by the pituitary gland lowers with age, is implicated in such aging phenomena as osteoporosis, depression, decreased energy levels, wrinkling, lower sexual function, lower muscle mass, and general aches and pains.

Dr. Frederick Tims, chair of Music Therapy at Michigan State University, led a team of researchers to conduct the study, called the Music Making and Wellness Project. The study looked at 61 retirees taking group keyboard lessons in Florida over a period of two 10-week semesters. Health measures were administered before the lessons and after each semester.

One significant change was in the mental health of the group keyboard players, with no change in a 69-strong control group. A measurable decrease in anxiety among the keyboardists was evident early on and appeared after only 10 weeks of lessons, remaining after 20 weeks of lessons. And the group’s feelings of loneliness, measured by the UCLA Loneliness Scale, decreased across the span of the lessons, while the control group scores stayed the same.

Long-term care workers are among the most highly stressed employees in the modern health care economy, but their dissatisfaction, burnout, and high turnover may have a solution in one of humanity's oldest activities: music making.

Researchers found that a specific Recreational Music-Making (RMM) program drastically reduced employee burnout and mood disturbances, with huge projected economic benefits for the long-term health care industry. A study conducted by the Meadville, Pennsylvania-based Mind-Body Wellness Center saw 112 employees at the Westbury United Methodist Retirement Community in Meadville participate in group drumming and digital piano exercises as well as movement, breathing, and imagery exercises. After the program many reported an increased sense of group nurturing and heightened interpersonal awareness.

RMM is a particularly useful workplace stress reduction tool as it can be enjoyed by all employees, regardless of musical background. It is unlike “regular” music making as its outcome is the enjoyment and well-being of the participant and the group, not artistic or aesthetic, and it requires no talent or training.

Do you have difficulty recalling names? Do you search for your glasses, only to find them on top of your head? Are your car keys playing a perpetual game of hide-and-seek? Your memory may not be as sharp as it once was, but that’s not necessarily a sign of Alzheimer’s disease, writes Dr. William Umiker on www.inhis.com. Only 10% of people older than 65 develop Alzheimer’s; the rest of us have to come to terms with the fact that our memory naturally will deteriorate over time.

But there is hope. For one, an adult brain that remains active and challenged will compensate for a loss of brain cells by creating new neural networks and making do with what gray matter remains. Research also suggests that older people do better than the young at cognitive skills that require experience and learning, such as vocabulary, numerical skills, spatial orientation, and intra-personal communication. They do less well than the young when it comes to learning new complex tasks (programming that DVD player, for instance) and multi-tasking.

Umiker reports that one of the best ways to keep the brain active is to challenge it with music making. “A good brain-boosting activity is playing a musical instrument,” writes Umiker. “It requires simultaneous reading, listening, memorizing, and manual skills. It produces multiple benefits for the brain, including boosting its ability to resist trauma and illness. Music has also been found to reduce the negative impact of stress.”

A 21-year study carried out at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University, New York, and published in the New England Journal of Medicine, suggests a link between intellectual stimulation and a lower risk of several kinds of senile dementia. The study was lead by Dr. Joe Verghese, assistant professor of neurology at Einstein College.

A group of 469 men and women 75 years and older were studied between 1980 and 2001. Before enrolling in the study, participants were screened against existing dementia. They each gave details about how often they participated in six cognitive activities: reading, writing, making music, doing crosswords, taking part in group discussions, and playing board games.

Over the course of the study 124 participants developed dementias such as Alzheimer’s disease, vascular dementia, and mixed dementia. In the remainder of the group, the strongest correlation between activity and lowered risk of dementia was found in participants who danced, but reduced risk was observed in those who made music, read, and played board games.

There's nothing nicer than playing a tune in your head—until you can't turn it off. The phenomenon of catchy melodies not letting go has spanned the ages. In 1882, Mark Twain wrote in a short story of an annoying ''jingling rhyme'' that became indelibly lodged in the author's mind until he passed the curse along to another hapless victim. In 2003, a community board in Brooklyn called for a limit on the ''Mr. Softee'' jingle played by ice-cream trucks—a jingle that can be unbearably memorable for those subjected to it for extended periods.

Research has helped define, but not explain, the experience, reports The New York Times. A study by the University of Cincinnati looked at the affliction, which the author, Dr. James Kellaris, calls earworms, a word he says conveys the parasitic nature of the unending tunes, which lodge too deep in the mental continuum to be easily ousted.

The study also showed that musicians and those with compulsive tendencies are the most afflicted. There can be a positive side for some. The singer-songwriter Neil Diamond says those repetitive notes that will not go away have spawned some of his biggest hits. ''If I wasn't in the business of songwriting, I'd probably be seeing a doctor,'' Diamond says. Most of Diamond’s songs spring from a melodic swatch of six notes repeating in his mind. ''I'll be driving or watching TV or having lunch, and it just invades,'' he explains. ''It's a horrible obsession, but it seems to have paid off.''

The greater susceptibility of musicians may simply reflect how much more music they listen to. But other research has shown that musical training leads to changes in brain function and structure in regions involved in the perception of melody. Some kind of self-perpetuating stimulus of these circuits may explain why tunes such as ''Y.M.C.A.'' can literally become branded in the brain. Neural circuits for music perception also appear in the temporal lobes, which are involved in more basic sound processing.

Is there a cure for earworms? Singing the song aloud can sometimes erase it. ''It's a familiar pattern of itching and scratching,'' Kellaris says. ''The only way to 'scratch' a cognitive itch is to rehearse the start involuntarily, as the brain detects an incongruity or something 'exceptional' in the musical stimulus.”