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Listen to what the experts said…

Research has shown that music has a profound effect on your body and psyche. In fact, there’s a growing field of health care known as Music Therapy, which uses music to heal. Those who practice music therapy are finding a benefit in using music to help cancer patients, children with ADD, and others, and even hospitals are beginning to use music and music therapy to help with pain management, to help ward off depression, to promote movement, to calm patients, to ease muscle tension, and for many other benefits that music and music therapy can bring. This is not surprising, as music affects the body and mind in many powerful ways. The following are some of effects of music, which help to explain the effectiveness of music therapy:

• Brain Waves: Research has shown that music with a strong beat can stimulate brainwaves to resonate in sync with the beat, with faster beats bringing sharper concentration and more alert thinking, and a slower tempo promoting a calm, meditative state. Also, research has found that the change in brainwave activity levels that music can bring can also enable the brain to shift speeds more easily on its own as needed, which means that music can bring lasting benefits to your state of mind, even after you’ve stopped listening.
• Breathing and Heart Rate: With alterations in brainwaves comes changes in other bodily functions. Those governed by the autonomic nervous system, such as breathing and heart rate can also be altered by the changes music can bring. This can mean slower breathing, slower heart rate, and an activation of the relaxation response, among other things. This is why music and music therapy can help counteract or prevent the damaging effects of chronic stress, greatly promoting not only relaxation, but health.
• State of Mind: Music can also be used to bring a more positive state of mind, helping to keep depression and anxiety at bay. This can help prevent the stress response from wreaking havoc on the body, and can help keep creativity and optimism levels higher, bringing many other benefits.
• Other Benefits: Music has also been found to bring many other benefits, such as lowering blood pressure (which can also reduce the risk of stroke and other health problems over time), boost immunity, ease muscle tension, and more. With so many benefits and such profound physical effects, it’s no surprise that so many are seeing music as an important tool to help the body in staying (or becoming) healthy.

Using Music Therapy:

With all these benefits that music can carry, it’s no surprise that music therapy is growing in popularity. For more information on music therapy, visit the American Music Therapy Association’s website.

Using Music On Your Own:

While music therapy is an important discipline, you can also achieve benefits from music on your own. This article on music, relaxation and stress management can explain more of how music can be an especially effective tool for stress management, and can be used in daily life.

Wishing all mothers out there a happy mother’s day. Let’s sing for our mothers…

Music therapy cannot cure diseases, but can speed the healing process…

A visiting foreign national, who claimed to be a music therapist, recently sold CDs in Singapore priced between S$400 and S$1,000. He claimed the music on them could “cure” diseases and ailments. Members of the newly formed Singapore Association of Music Therapy were quick to denounce him as a “mercenary charlatan”.

Music therapists pooh-pooh the notion that ills can be cured by putting on a generic CD of soothing music. “This person is not a qualified music therapist,” said the association in a statement to the press. “While passive listening to music is one of the many ways in which music is used, more often than not, active interventions are used, like playing instruments, singing, improvising, and composing.” Trained music therapists take pains to find out about their patient’s history, make a diagnosis of what would help the patient and then make a musical prescription.

In Singapore, there are few bona fide music therapists as music as a form of clinical therapy is not viewed seriously. But the practice is gaining a foothold. The association, with 11 members, aims to increase public awareness and to serve as a contact point for local music therapists.

In January, the Singapore General Hospital (SGH) – where music therapist Dr Patsy Tan is based – started a music therapy programme for hearing-impaired children called Music To The Ears. Apart from SGH, the small music therapy community here mostly operates outside hospitals and is centred on treating special-needs children in the special schools or at-risk youth.

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No one’s sure exactly how music heals, but it looks like our brains are wired to respond to it.

“There’s something intrinsically musical about the brain’s neurological structure and the muscular function of the human organism,” says Clive Robbins, DMM (Doctor of Medical Matters), cofounder of the Nordoff-Robbins Center for Music Therapy at New York University in New York City. “At a nonverbal level, music activates our minds, integrates our attention, and seems to help regulate some body functions.

In fact, the right song seems to work in more than one way–distracting us from pain, boosting mood, reviving old memories, even prompting the body to match its rhythms. “We know music is so incredibly complex. It has tempo, rhythm, melody, harmony. And so it stimulates the brain in many ways at once,” says Alicia Ann Clair, PhD, a board-certified music therapist at the University of Kansas in Lawrence.

Una O’Donovan (Emunah Ruth) has been playing the harp for the sick and dying for over two years, on a daily basis. Her main focus is Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, from where she moves the harp to an AIDS Hospice, Children’s Hospital, Memorial services, etc.

The effect has been phenomenal – surprising even Una herself. In fact, it is a continual learning process for her, as she delves deeper into the possibilities of improving the atmosphere and feelings of not only patients, but also their relatives and the staff. Just the sight of the harp trundling down the corridor has patients and visitors perking up, calling out from their rooms and asking whether the harp was available to play for them. The harp, more than other instruments, seems to have these angelic connections with heaven, so that there is already a positive response even before they have heard a note!

The scientific basis for the effect of live harp music has been proved in clinically controlled studies. For example, a hospital in Israel had the babies in incubators in three groups: one had no music at all, one had CD’s piped through loudspeakers, and one had a live harpist playing to them.

The result was that the group with no music progressed the slowest, the group with piped music a little faster, and the group with the live harp sounds became viable outside the incubators in less time. Apparently, the live harp music made the babies relax more, so they could sleep deeper and better, so that they when they woke up they were stronger at feeding. This latter group cut the time in the incubators by (on average) two days.

This makes economic sense to the hospital administration, as it is cheaper to pay a harpist than to maintain a premature baby in an incubator. Some hospitals here in the Los Angeles area, have a harpist on staff. City of Hope is one such facility, where the patients can go to the library and check out a book or a harp. They then get help from the staff harpist in playing their favorite tunes, while laying a small harp on their chest, or in the crook of their arm.

Not only Una, but other harpists as well, have reported high blood pressure subsiding, and/or a too rapid breathing rate or heart rate slowing, while the patient listens to the harp. It’s also very therapeutic in the evenings to induce sleep.

Una plays for every ethnic group and every religion, and tries to match what she plays to the musical experience of the listeners. It’s heartwarming to see a Russian patient smile and become teary-eyed at the sound of music familiar to them from back home. Whereas, someone who was used to going to the Disney Concert Hall soaks up classical music. Funnily enough, the patient often doesn’t realize that it is music they need – until they hear it.

Music is a powerful form of expression. Songs may trigger old memories, happiness or even sad experiences. This is the strongest proof that music and human emotions are interconnected. Giving depressive patients an outlet such as music is the best way for the patient to, little by little, let out the source of their depression and alleviates patients’ moods.

Music therapy is the use of music for therapeutic purposes by a trained person. The power of music over the human mind is beyond your imagination. Music, then and now, has been very helpful for everyday life. From the primitive caveman to the modern scientists, everyone would agree in saying music is indeed the food for the soul, and in this therapy, for the body as well. The idea of using music as a healing influence dates back to the time of Plato and Aristotle. In the modern world, music for therapy came to the fore when musicians played for war veterans to cure them of physical and emotional trauma. Since many of the patients responded well, nurses and doctors began requesting the services of musicians for therapy.

A trained music therapist gauges the emotional movements, physical health, social functioning and cognitive skills through the patient’s responses to music. Once the assessment is completed, the practitioner designs music session accordingly for different individuals or groups. The therapeutic music is prepared based on client needs and uses music improvisation, song writing, lyric discussion, imagery and musical performances.

In hospitals, music therapy is used to alleviate pain and is often used in conjunction with anesthesia or pain medication. A question that is often raised is why use music if anesthesia does the same thing? Music helps because it dissolves emotional barriers and elevates the patient’s mood. Music also counteracts depression, calms and even sedates patients. In a nutshell, music helps reduce muscle tension and brings on a deep and satisfying relaxation.

As I have mentioned in my previous posting, music therapy, for healthy individuals can act as a form of stress relief through active music making. This includes drumming, using the guitar to make music. The passive approach requires listening for relaxation. Music can also be used as accompaniment during exercise.

If you are not aware, music therapy became recognized as an effective and scientifically-backed mode of treatment. The first music therapy degree program ever was established in 1944 in Michigan.

Frequently Asked Questions:

1. What types of people do music therapists work with?

You can find music therapists working with a wide variety of people. Some examples include the mentally ill, the physically handicapped, those who have been abused, the elderly including those suffering from Alzheimer’s and dementia, the terminally ill, the mentally retarded and the developmentally delayed, the traumatically brain injured, those with learning disabilities, as well as those persons who do not suffer from a clinical diagnosis.

2. How long has the field of music therapy been around?

While music has been used as a therapeutic mean for centuries, music therapy did not emerge as an organized profession until 1950 with the establishment of the National Association for Music Therapy and the American Association for Music Therapy in 1971. When the two associations merged in 1998, the new acronym became AMTA. The American Music Therapy Association. AMTA’s mission is “To advance public awareness of the benefits of music therapy and increase access to quality music therapy services in a rapidly changeing world.” (AMTA, 1998)

3. Where do music therapists work?

Music therapists work in hospitals, nursing facilities, schools, treatment centers, hospices, group homes, as well as in private practice.

4. Can you tell me some of the kinds of goals a music therapist might address?

Music therapists work towards a number of non-musical goals including improving communication skills, decreasing inappropriate behavior, improving academic and motor skills, increasing attention span, strengthening social and leisure skills, pain management and stress reduction. Music therapy can also help individuals on their journey of self-growth and understanding.

5. Tell me about some of the music therapy interventions that might be used in a typical session.

Music therapists draw from an extensive array of music activities and interventions. For example, the therapist and client might compose songs for the purpose of expression of feelings; one client might learn to play the piano for the purpose of improving fine motor skills, while another client might use instruments to improvise unspoken emotions. Music therapists may also use music and movement activities, singing, lyric discussion or music and imagery (including the Bonny Method of Guided Imagery and Music) to help the client reach their goals.

6. What is the Bonny Method of Guided Imagery and Music?

This technique (known as GIM) was developed by music therapist Dr. Helen Bonny. It is a music-centered therapeutic process to access the human psyche and lead to self-actualization and healing. GIM involves imaging to music in an alternate state of consciousness while sharing the imagery experience with a trained guide/therapist. When used as a therapeutic tool, GIM can lead to a deep uncovering of hidden emotional responses and stimulate creative insights

Music therapy is the prescribed use of music and musical interventions in order to restore, maintain, and improve emotional, physical, physiological, and spiritual health and well-being. Within this definition are the key elements which define interventions as music therapy.

1. Music therapy is prescribed by members of the client’s treatment team. Members can include doctors, social workers, psychologists, teachers, case workers, or parents.
2. Music is the primary therapeutic tool. Using music to establish a trusting relationship, the music therapist then works to improve the client’s physical and mental functioning through carefully structured activities. Examples can include singing, listening, playing instruments, composition, moving to music, and music and imagery exercises.
3. Music is administered by a trained music therapist. A music therapist’s education and training is extensive. Musical interventions are developed and used by the therapist based on his/her knowledge of the music’s affect on behaviour, the client’s strengths and weaknesses, and the therapeutic goals.
4. Music therapy is received by a client and it targets a wide range of clinical populations and client ages.
5. Music therapy works towards specific therapeutic goals and objectives. Goal areas include communicative, academic, motor, emotional, and social skills. It is important to be aware that while clients may develop their musical skills during treatment, these skills are not the primary concern of the therapist. Rather it is the affect such musical development might have on the client’s physical, psychological and socio-economical functioning.