The karaoke cure

My kids hate my singing.

Whenever I open my voice, in a car or at home, they instantly tell me to zip the lips.

They are typical. Professional singers perform much better than the rest of us. We think of singing as audience members, not participants.

We may be doing ourselves no favors. A story in Sify News, collected from a variety of news reports and studies, says singing is quite good for us:

• The University of Western Ontario has used it against snoring.
• The Sun reports humming can lift depression, and choir singing can help with asthma and other breathing problems.
• The University of Western Sydney found singing can soothe infants in intensive care.
• A Canadian study showed singing old songs to Alzheimer's patients caused them to join in, and remember.
• The University of Frankfurt in Germany has studied singing as a way to reduce stress.
• A two-year project using choirs helped reduce smoking in African-American neighborhoods by as much as one-third.

You can get a good karaoke station online, like the one above, for just $300. Get one for Christmas, or head over to a karaoke bar for New Year's. It might prove good for you, and it can't hurt.

Unless my kids hear you.