Four octave vocalist and conductor Bobby McFerrin has won ten Grammy Awards and sold over 20 million recordings. His diverse musical pursuits have partnered him with everyone from the Vienna Philharmonic to Herbie Hancock to the Muppets. Here, he addresses the importance of music in schools.

I'm a firm believer that you need to show kids how wonderful music is, and how important it is for their structural well-being. When you do something for the arts, you're doing it for your heart. I hope kids understand that anyone at any musical level can participate in music, because what music is really good at is bringing people together, making a community of people. You don't have to be a master musician to do that. You have to have desire and love, and then at any level you're at, you can participate, even if it's just singing a note. We get to your part, and that's you.

And for those kids who go on to be musicians, I hope they remember that they play for a living. I take that quite seriously -- that we play. And I hope they always remember why they're musicians, that it's not just a job, but that they became musicians because it's fun and they love it.

Bach believed that all musicians should sing, because when you sing, somehow you organically understand. As a conductor, when I want the orchestra to play something in a particular way, I sing it to them, because it conveys all the information that I want: the tempo, the dynamic, the shading, the little subtleties are right there. And so, I sing my parts to them.

One of the things I teach my students is that all the instruments have parents. There are two parents to all of the instruments. The drum is the father. The voice is the mother, and from them, everything comes. The voice is the supreme instrument. It's the only one that lives and breathes. Everyone should sing. No matter what they play, they should sing. Bach felt that way, and so do I. As artists, we are supposed to draw on our experience. Anything can be used.

I had a wonderful experience with Chick Corea. We played six cities, and we were performing at Wolftrap, and we got into this militaristic improvisation with guns. So I take anything, whether it's African chant, rhythm and blues or something really strange or off the wall. Sometimes, words don't quite convey what you want to say. Music is such a wonderful way of conveying your thoughts and feelings and emotions.

The general reaction toward this program is pretty positive. Music education is especially important now, because there's no funding in the public schools. It's very important for parents and teachers to become complacent about it, because they feel that they don't have the money to do it. I'm always encouraging them to start mini-music programs in their own classrooms.

The bottom line is exposing kids to music. Let them hear it in their environment. Feel it -- classical, spiritual, jazz, gospel, R&B, whatever it is, put it on. Let them hear it. Kids need at least that. You have to march them into another classroom to have music appreciation, and teach them about Bach, which would be great, or bring an orchestra into the school, a jazz group traveling through town. But if you don't have the money for that, you are responsible for bringing music into your classroom and making a musical environment. That's what kids need.