A friend of mine recently shared this video of Walter Blanding, a saxophonist and clarinet player for the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra. He’s shown here speaking to a group of young jazz musicians about how learning and playing music, particularly jazz, is one of the most important things a person can do with their life regardless of whether or not they become a professional musician. Here’s a pretty powerful quote from the video:

Learning jazz is special because it’s a music that’s based on improvisation. And the skills that you need in order to play jazz help you to learn how to use your mind, how to develop your creativity, how to be a person that can operate under pressure and still come out ok, how to be able to work together with a group even if the people that you’re working with think differently from you and you can still say, well, that’s ok, cause we’re all different but here we are, we’re a group and we’re gonna work together in harmony, and we’re gonna make an idea become a reality, even though each one of us has our own opinion, we don’t have to think the same. As a matter of fact we can take pride in saying that each one of us is different and still come together, that’s what jazz is about.

If you have 4 & 1/2 minutes, it would be well spent listening to this man’s wisdom on the significance of playing music and just how much in can positively influence our lives.

More info about Walter Blanding:
http://www.jazz.org/JLCO/walter-blanding/
Why is it important to play music? With Walter Blanding from the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra