Diversity in Music as Therapy

Music is unique as one's own culture and fingerprint. Each and every person has their own set of songs or artists that they enjoy and interventions are selected with those songs or artists to provide music therapy. The fun part of being a music therapist is getting to learn the music that clients enjoy either from memory or lyric sheets by singing and playing the music live for them and/or listening to client specified recordings and discussing themes, lyrics as well as musical elements. Within my adult therapy groups, I tend to focus on a set variety of songs, yet always ask for group members to request songs or make song choices within the group session and bring back new music or requested songs in the next sessions if that particular song requested is unknown. Depending on the setting, if I am working with Alzheimer's group, I may reuse a few songs from the week prior, but my main goal is to bring in new music each week to provide new opportunities and enhance quality of life experiences for my clients.

Creating new music and changing different musical elements is also used as an intervention to help with a variety of needs. Rapping and songwriting is a great way to express feelings as well as represent and/or discuss a life experience or future goals. Playing instruments either through drumming, learning guitar and/or other instruments and following rhythmic cues is also a great way to express emotions non-verbally to modulate moods, connect with other group members, create coping skills and enhance attention/focus. Just as we have a set playlist of songs for going to work out, music is starting to be utilized more in the workplace to provide a sense of comfort, motivation, alterness and engage more workers productively in tasks. It can also be used to escape reality and can produce good or bad memories related to past events that occured while listening to the music.

Ipods/music players with headphones maybe helpful to some but not necessary to those with Alzheimers who may become trapped in a bad memory while listening to a song that is triggering that experience. Live music presented by a music therapist can help to mitigate the feeling of being, "stuck" as the therapist can discuss those feelings with the client and transition with other related songs or topics to adjust the mood and experiences of the client. Movement to music is another fun intervention where instruments are set up in a way to promote exercise by striking a drum, reaching up to play a tambourine for upper body strength and/or marching to certain songs. I enjoy pairing certain songs to certain movements to increase range of motion in seniors which might include singing, "Que Sera Sera" and encouraging arm swings, "when the saint's go marching in" to marches, kicks to "let it be" and also dancing to several songs including, "The twist", "Johnny B. Good", "Rockin Robin", "Stand By Me" etc.

What songs titles and/or artists do you like?

How often do you listen to music?

How does the music you like make you feel?