Music belongs in school. Not because it's fun and entertaining; nor because it's relaxing or stimulating. Music is all of these, of course, but music belongs in school because it is crucial to learning. We comprehend the world in many ways. A journalist may describe a storm as wind wrecking devastation. A scientist will pinpoint it as 28.84 inches barometric pressure and winds at 82.5 miles per hour. Beethoven describes a storm by hurling an orchestra at our ears with blasts of brass and flickers of violins. Turner expresses it by making his whole canvas explode in breathtaking swirls of colors. None of these forms, words, numbers, sounds or colors, is sufficient to produce total understanding. Each provides particular insights. Together, they produce comprehension that is more complete.

This combination happens because the brain processes information in two ways. Some information is handled bit-by-bit with the bits converging at a single point. This kind of linear thinking is typically used in language and science. It yields facts, conclusions, and "right" answers. Yet, the brain can also process many bits of information all at once, releasing the results in multiple directions. This sort of thinking, called "holistic," leads to hypotheses, metaphors and ambiguity. It is essential to emotion, imagination and creativity.

Humans do not think first in facts in the present, and later in feelings. We use both, inextricably combined, in order to comprehend. One without the other would be unthinkable. It is equally unthinkable to consider a school curriculum complete unless it fosters both ways of thinking. True understanding is basic to life and education. However, only partial understanding results when schools fail to balance linear and holistic thinking. The academic and the esthetic are essential halves. This is why music is basic to education.

Undeniably, music study can center on historical facts or theoretical constructs, but such a focus denies music's unique contribution to learning. Its soul is then missing. The soul of music is rhythms explored, improvised, danced and developed. It is melody, harmony, and timbre combined in intricate designs and in intensely personal expression. Thinking musically means thinking in all of these ways simultaneously. Thinking artistically means seeing a multitude of responses to a given problem. Music is creative energy captured in sound. It heightens feeling by saying what words never express.

It is essentially indescribable. Music is "feelingful" intelligence. It is holistic thinking with an attitude. No other part of the curriculum can duplicate this unique and powerful way of knowing. Throughout history, whenever humans have confronted the ultimate questions of life and death, they have turned to the arts for expression. Some cultures have been found to exist without reading and writing, but not one has been found without the arts. No verbal equivalent to Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, the Sistine Chapel, the Taj Mahal exists. Nor is their message understood at a glance. Their meanings must be searched out, unearthed, examined, and experienced within the artists' cultural contexts. The process is both lengthy and demanding.

Schools that fail to foster the development of "feelingful" intelligence deny students access to a paramount part of their culture. They deny them a basic key to understanding themselves and the world around them. They also deny them communion with the most profound forms of human achievement. In the coming century, survival will depend upon those who have learned to handle threats with imagination, change with improvisation, and human relations with empathy. Therefore, quality education must mean total education. That means teaching and learning in every way possible, not just reading and writing and calculating, but also feeling and moving, drawing and singing, dancing and creating. Consequently, this is why music must exist in the the heart of the curriculum, not as entertainment or relaxation. Instead, it must be a unique way of knowing and as the foundation of "feelingful" and meaningful intelligence.