1. Improves your capacity to work in a team

Working as part of a team requires peer interaction and communication, which encourage teamwork, as students must collaborate to create a crescendo or perform as a band/orchestra. Benoit Academy of Steel Pan offers steel pan education classes, in which students will have the opportunity to lead a melody or be the team leader for their section of players may it be tenor or the bass section. Our motto for teamwork is “One Band, One Sound”.

2. Increases your self-esteem

At the Academy we encourage our students to simply be themselves. Everyone has room for improvement and it’s okay to accept constructive criticism because it can only make you a better Steel Pan musician. We teach that turning negative feedback into positive, can help build self-confidence and this is what’s needed to be an excellent musician.

3. Helps with improving your thinking

There are many ways in which playing an instrument can improve your thinking. It can minimize your stress, allow you to think clearly and improve your mood. One study showed that children who had three years or more musical instrument training, performed better than those who didn’t learn an instrument in auditory discrimination abilities and fine motor skills.

4. Develop parts of the brain associated with language and reasoning

This information produced from Psychological and neuroscientific research indicates that musical training in children is associated with heightening of sound sensitivity as well as enhancement in verbal abilities and general reasoning skills. Children who has musical training develop a better verbal memory, second language pronunciation accuracy and reading ability. There is even a possibility to some degree that learning to play an instrument can predict academic performance and IQ in young adulthood.

5. Effective in problem solving both academically and socially

Learning a musical instrument such as Steel Pan can give children the benefit of achieving their academic and social goals because reading music requires the child to count rhythms, notes and applying it to the steel pan by way of reading the notation on the musical score. It can improve the student’s mathematical ability. At the Academy the friends you make becomes family. It’s common that the people you play a musical instrument with, can help you develop lasting friendships. It can help introverted students to interact with others and thereby developing their social skills.

6. Playing the instrument is like a full-body workout for the brain.

Steel Pan can give the brain a full workout by the memorizing of musical notations or even simply reading music. It can also give the entire body a full physical workout by the hype of the music and the coordinated rhythmic dancing of performers.