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I am not a teacher but a parent and will share my experience. I have two boys with special needs. The oldest is 13 and in the 8th grade his labels incluce ADHD, inattentive type, CAPD, language disorder, and dyslexia. He is a trumpet player in the school band and has been playing routinely since the 7th grade. Since starting band we have noticed an increase in his ability to pay attention, increased social skills, and improved self esteem. His band teacher commented that the only real difficulties he has with my son is that he can’t understand what is said while the band is playing and he is teaching at the same time, and his poor organizational skills. This teacher has been very accomodating, he is sure to give him the instructions when no music is playing, sends e-mails to me to let me know what is needed or upcoming concert dates, and has truly tried to mentor him and help him all around not just music. My youngest son falls on the Autism spectrum and his reaction to music and music class varies greatly. He loves classical music and finds this to be very soothing to him. He can not tolerate the noise at the school concerts—too much input. His reaction in music class it self is dependent on what volume and tone class gets too. Hope this helps.

Know of a case of attention deficit where the ability to play music was slightly affected, that is, the student was not able to maintain a steady musical beat naturally; however, when using the right medicine (a stimulant/alerting agent) for ADHD, the student temporarily could keep the beat noticeably better. The musical improvement was directly related to the ADHD medicine which only worked temporarily. The student experienced a short attention span, inattention, and distractibility (which the ADHD medicine temporarily relieved - enough to be helpful - but far short of a cure). It was most interesting to see that a medicine for ADHD could temporarily work well - yet imperfectly.