Universal music education programs have become increasingly popular among policy makers in Germany and other developed countries. They are presented as innovative policies that improve educational opportunities for the poor. The political hopes are based on the assumption that learning a musical instrument positively develops cognitive and non-cognitive skills. However, the educational effects of universal music education have been insufficiently studied. Using data from two household panel studies in Germany (SOEP and FiD), I examine whether a universal music education program decreases the strong association between socio-economic status and access to instrumental music lessons. I further investigate whether the program affected the development of non-cognitive skills as well as the likelihood to attend an upper secondary school. Regional and temporal variation in program implementation allows me to identify causal effects. Preliminary results suggest that universal music education projects successfully provide more equal access to extracurricular music activities. The program also shows small positive effects on social skills, in particular for children from disadvantaged social backgrounds.