They say desperate times call for desperate measures. But in this time of economic uncertainty, the desperate cutting of budgets for arts funding and, by extension, all types of arts education, including music, is not prudent. That is the consensus of several national and local studies, which converge on a single point--that the arts actually can…

The aims of this investigation were (1) to measure the impact of arts-related activities on the perceived quality of life of a representative sample of British Columbians aged 18 years or more in the spring of 2007, and (2) to compare the findings of this study with those of a sample of 1,027 adults drawn from five B.C. communities (Comox Valley,…