Dad doesn’t want son to play drums

Q: My son Toby signed up to play the drums in his school band — against my advice. I do like the discipline playing the drums requires, but I’m not sure it’s really a musical instrument and I dread the noise factor. Should I encourage or discourage him from his choice?

Andrew F., Bethesda, Maryland

A: You are spot on about how learning the drums requires discipline, and there are ways to dodge the noise problem (more on that later). But you’re wrong that they’re not musical. Listen to the musical and rhythmic sounds Neil Peart, the great drummer for Rush, and the influential jazz drummer Buddy Rich could create. Learning to read and write music is also important for drummers who want to refine their skills, so your son can get similar musical training (and brain benefits) as he would from learning the piano or guitar.

Furthermore, while playing any instrument enhances neural pathways and requires practice, stamina and an ongoing commitment, a recent study from Germany highlights the unique benefits of drumming: Turns out drummers’ motor control and coordination far surpasses that of untrained people.

Think about it. Drummers can play different rhythms with each hand simultaneously.

And while almost every musical instrument requires the use of two hands, brain imaging shows that the area of the brain connecting the left and right spheres (corpus callous) was many times stronger in drummers. The study was done by having 20 professional drummers play on an edited version of Andrew Hudson’s Drum Brain software for PlayStation 3.

Now, that brings us to your other area of concern: living with the noise of a beginning drummer. You could wear noise-canceling headphones, but these days, much of the learning can be done quietly! Electronic (versus acoustic) drum sets can have cymbals, a snare, tom toms and bass drums, and you can assign volume and pitch to stick velocity. The player can listen on headphones — no ambient sound in the house!