BioRitmo with OLA: Rhythm, Learning and the Adaptable Brain

A familiar movement can become surprisingly unfamiliar when you change its timing.

Open one hand. Close the other. Switch. Keep the rhythm. Now alternate between two different handshapes.

Your intention is clear. Your fingers may have other plans.

On July 31, 2024, I collaborated with OLA of Eastern Long Island to lead a virtual BioRitmo workshop through Zoom and Facebook Live. Open to participants without previous musical experience, the session combined rhythmic exercises with an introduction to neuroplasticity, neurogenesis and the relationship between movement and learning.

I created BioRitmo to bring my interests in music, the body and learning into a participatory practice. The workshop gave people an opportunity to explore these ideas through their own attention, coordination and responses to a challenge.

When a simple movement becomes a learning task

Some exercises involved opening and closing the hands or moving the little fingers in and out while maintaining a rhythm. One of the most challenging involved alternating between a peace gesture and the American Sign Language “I love you” handshape.

Recognizing each shape was one task. Switching between them in time with the beat was another.

The exercise asked participants to remember a sequence, coordinate their movements and attend to timing. If a hand repeated the previous shape or missed a transition, there was something concrete to notice and adjust.

That moment interests me as an educator: the distance between understanding an instruction and being able to perform it.

Rhythm makes that distance perceptible. We can hear or feel where a movement falls in relation to the beat, then use that information on the next attempt.

Neuroplasticity: how experience shapes the brain

During the workshop, I introduced neuroplasticity, the nervous system’s capacity to change its organization and function in response to experience and learning.

Musical practice offers researchers a useful way to study that capacity because it combines perception, movement and timing. A 2020 study, for example, compared 15 novice participants who completed eight weeks of drum training with 16 comparison participants. Researchers observed changes in brain structure, including parts of the cerebellum and connected cortical regions. The findings provide evidence of plasticity associated with sustained drumming practice.^[1]

This research gives context to something musicians encounter through practice: a coordination pattern that initially demands considerable attention can become more manageable with learning.

The hand exercises offered an accessible starting point for discussing that process. Participants could encounter an unfamiliar pattern, notice what made it difficult and experiment with repeating it.

For me, that is a meaningful relationship between science and teaching: an explanation can give a person another way to understand the experience they are having.

Neurogenesis: a different kind of change

We also discussed neurogenesis, the formation of new neurons.

Neuroplasticity encompasses many kinds of change, including changes in existing neural connections and networks. Neurogenesis refers specifically to the generation of new nerve cells.

Research has provided evidence of neurogenesis in the adult human hippocampus, a brain region involved in memory. Its extent, regulation and relationship to cognition remain active areas of investigation.^[2]

These concepts belong in a conversation about the brain’s capacity for change, but they describe different processes. Evidence that musical training supports neuroplasticity does not establish that a particular hand exercise, or one BioRitmo session, generates new neurons.

My interest in bringing these subjects into the workshop was to make learning itself part of the conversation. We could explore a rhythmic task while also considering what it means to acquire a skill.

Language as a rhythmic tool

The workshop also introduced rhythmic patterns through spoken language.

Words contain accents, durations and recurring shapes. A spoken phrase can give someone an audible reference for a pattern before they learn to describe it through musical notation.

Participant Darwin Verdugo reflected on that connection:

“Mila Tina’s workshop on world rhythms, neuroplasticity, and neurogenesis was fascinating. I learned that rhythms are easier to learn through spoken language…”

Darwin Verdugo, workshop participant

I also incorporated encouraging language into the practice. Alongside the movement, I wanted participants to notice their response to difficulty.

Do we interpret an unfamiliar task as evidence that we cannot do it? Can we stay curious long enough to try another approach?

Those questions matter to how I teach. I want the workshop to make room for effort, adjustment and the occasional uncooperative finger.

Holding your rhythm while listening

Another idea at the center of BioRitmo is maintaining your own rhythmic part while remaining attentive to others.

In an ensemble, different patterns contribute to a shared piece. Each musician has a part to sustain and a wider relationship to hear.

That offers a practical way to think about individuality and cooperation. How do we contribute clearly? How do we respond without losing track of our own part?

The virtual workshop introduced this idea through rhythm and discussion. It is a question I continue exploring across teaching, collaboration and performance.

What participants carried forward

Erika Vargas, from OLA, shared that the exercises stayed with her after the session:

“I find myself doing the exercises at any chance I get. The hand exercise was especially hard, but like Mila said, ‘it’s good for the brain!’ Ever since, I have started to look at challenges as opportunities to get stronger and be more resilient.”

Erika Vargas, OLA of Eastern Long Island

She also expressed interest in an in-person workshop.

Her response describes a personal experience: a challenging exercise becoming something she wanted to revisit, and a different way of approaching difficulty.

That continuation matters to me. A workshop can introduce an idea, offer a practice and leave someone with a question they want to keep exploring.

Through BioRitmo, I want to make the relationship between rhythm and learning tangible. Something we can discuss, try, reconsider and practice.

Sometimes that inquiry begins with a drum. Sometimes with a phrase.

Sometimes with two hands discovering that knowing the pattern and playing it are two very different things.

Credits: BioRitmo, created and facilitated by Mila Tina. Virtual workshop presented in collaboration with OLA of Eastern Long Island, July 31, 2024, through Zoom and Facebook Live. Participant reflections originally shared in the August 5, 2024 RitmoFit XP Spotlight.