Music has always played massive roles in both of our lives, taking up large portions of our afterschool time, but we’re definitely not alone. In fact, more than 40% of high schoolers in the US are active music learners. Derek Wu was no exception. Even after leaving home for MIT and eventually landing a job as a software engineer at Google, he remained extremely committed to music.

Instead of doing a quick google search to find 100 benefits that music has to your brain, we choose to talk to Derek, a great aficionado of classical music. Today, he’s answering our “soul searching question:” why we are learning music, and what it takes to stick with it, enjoying a lifelong relationship with it.