This study investigates the level of active participation in music activities and its relation to subjective well-being in amateur and professional musicians. Subjective well-being is one’s evaluation of their satisfaction, fulfilment, and emotional reaction to events of their life. Previous studies have found that musicians have a higher level of subjective well-being than non-musicians. 

However, these studies have not specifically investigated differences between amateur and professional musicians. This paper presents a correlational study using the Music Use (MUSE) Questionnaire to measure music engagement and music engagement style, the Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS) to measure cognitive aspects of subjective well-being, and the Scale of Positive and Negative Experience (SPANE) to measure the affective aspects of subjective well-being. 146 participants participated in this study consisting of 80 amateur and 66 professional musicians in Indonesia. By using the Spearman correlation, this study shows that music engagement is significantly correlated with subjective well-being for amateur musicians, but not for professional musicians. 

It was also found that amateur musicians had significantly higher levels of subjective well-being compared to professional musicians. These results indicate that the way professional and amateur musicians perceive and process music-making is different, and that these differences result in divergent perceptions between the two groups.