“Should auld acquaintance be forgot
And never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot
And days of auld lang syne?……”
The truth is when we are in the thick of designing our sessions we often forget some of the basics. Unless you have consistent supervision we are often not aware we are overlooking these vital concepts. So, today I’ve pulled my top 5 stumbling blocks when designing music experiences.
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The study sought to understand how music therapy altered mood for adolescents participating in group services as well as the effect that demographics had on mood alteration, or not. The study was conducted at a large pediatric psychiatric hospital and included over 350 participants aged 12-21 in 3 different units of the hospital.
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Part of why I think that this genre is so polarizing and intimidating is that there is admittedly a “dark” side to metal culture and a lot of musicians got their reputation through shock value, like marylin manson for instance, who capitalized on controversial or violent lyrics and themes, dress and culture. If your clients are listening to music with heavy or dark thematic aspects then there is a talking point. Looking through our clinical lenses, we can use the music as a point of entry to connect with their most raw emotions.
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In designing our practice today I sought to create an experience that is simple that you can do everyday, multiple times a day, whenever and wherever you are. We are going to combine breath and affirmations in this experience together. To start I will guide you through a brief breath exercise to ground your body and mind and then lead you in 3 affirmations. We will repeat the affirmations 7 times because research supports the idea that to remember something we must repeat it at least 7 times. I’ll say the affirmations out loud and you are invited to repeat them with me outloud or in your mind. Let’s get started……..
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Gratitude is a beneficial practice that we probably could agree on on an anecdotal basis, so I went to the research to see what evidence there was for the benefits of gratitude. In one recent study, published in Brain, Behavior and Immunity authors Hazlett et al. note that because of the brain-body connection between gratitude and support-giving behavior, gratitude may may reap the same benefits of amygdala deactivation and reduction in threat-responses, thereby reducing inflammation in the body and increasing immune responses……
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Because of early technology like the phonograph and the record, music recording and listening software has evolved and is now standard on all computers, tablets and almost all smart devices. Music therapy as a field has benefited greatly from the ability to listen to and share music. As clinicians, we’re able to learn new music, record resources for our clients and clients benefit from music shared by their favorite artists. We’re able to connect over music listening, learning and creating.
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In honor of the holiday I’ve asked everyone to share a drumming intervention! So for this week's clinical segment, we’re going to go around the virtual table here and take a few minutes to share and demonstrate some intervention inspiration. So tell us about the intervention, the song/chant/music you’re using, how you would set it up and what population you might use it with along with any extensions or adaptations you could make!
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Around the dawn of the 1930’s, when sound was synchronized with celluloid of movie film, composers began to compose scores to match films, most of which was orchestral music from band composers. In 1951, the score for the film A Street Car Named Desire set the stage for Western, Original music compositions in film. Soon after-the song" “Oh, My Darling” was so successful that there was high demand for original music to be written for movies for both promotional purposes and to radio airtime.
Hello and welcome back to Music Therapy and Beyond. I’m Elizabeth and today we are going to be talking about wellness. You haven’t heard from me in a while. Last time I was talking to all the grown-ups who listen to our podcast, but today I’m talking to the kids. I want to share one of my favorite things to do when I’m feeling a little overwhelmed after a long, long day. Before we begin, let me tell you a little about our exercise……
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Music therapy is an effective form of treatment for many reasons. We’ve highlighted some of this across our podcast, but this is a big question to answer! Music therapy can be effective for a number of outcomes: mental health, rehabilitation, early childhood development, older adult care, hospice, pre, peri, and postnatal, trauma- The list goes on. If someone is motivated by music and has a therapeutic need, I would encourage them to have an assessment or consult with a music therapist. Each person and need is unique so seeking out a music therapist to help you identify ways that music therapy may be or may not be appropriate is the best thing to do. There is no prescriptive or one size fits all treatment. Speaking of which, there were several diagnoses that were searched for specifically quite a bit:
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I don’t know about you, but whenever I think about scope of practice for music therapy I see a fuzzy, gray cloud. This is how my brain pictures the “gray area” and this gaseous proverbial space is scary to me because in some ways it’s always changing, hard to define and not always a clearly marked boundary. I like to operate with clarity and I’m always trying to be mindful about stepping outside of what is appropriate in our field and for my individual practice. So today we’re going to talk through what is clear about music therapy scope of practice as well as how to assess yourself as an individual practitioner to ensure that you’re remaining within your own ethical “cloud” of scope of practice.
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I will leave you with a final quote from the authors “it is possible that these young people are more familiar and comfortable with chaos than we are as music therapists. It may then be counter-intuitive to attempt to eliminate chaos so that we can experience ordered, highly structured groups at odds with the environments to which young people return.”
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How do you feel when someone gives you free music therapy intervention resources? I always feel excited and happy and inspired! All the big, wonderful feelings. Well that’s exactly what this episode is about. I’m going to be talking through a free intervention targeting Emotional Identification and Expression. I’m giving you the powerpoint visuals and the music and teaching you how it works- all of which has been written and developed by me, Ellisa Morris, MT-BC.
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Today Maggie guides us through a music and imagery experience. This will be followed up next week (May 3rd) with more information about the Guided Imagery and Music method for our learning segment. CAUTION: Please do not listen to this while driving. Enjoy this in the safety of your home and not on the road.
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In music therapy, we have a physical and auditory medium to promote regulation in the body organically within our practice. If we use Polyvagal theory to help inform our regulation practices in all types of therapy sessions (but especially when working with clients with trauma backgrounds) we can join in this groundbreaking approach to traditional psychotherapy and utilize the fullest potential of our toolset within the body- starting with the brain.
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It is becoming increasingly common that music therapists work with clients who are from other countries and cultural backgrounds. Music can play an important role in the culture of every client, so when preparing client-preferred music it’s important to be intentional about honoring different styles, genres, and languages of music that are client preferred in order to connect with your client and be most effective in therapy. This can be daunting at times, since you may not be able to speak the language, you don’t share the same background, or perhaps western instruments are not even capable of producing the same sounds and notes. This is where we have to get creative!
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With all of this being said, I’ve still seen a tremendous amount of growth within most of the individuals that I serve- even through a screen. I do believe that some people respond better to this approach than others, but when it is all that you have, I’ve seen teachers, paraprofessionals, students and even myself, make the most of it!
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I’m going to be going over some very basic and doable techniques for vocals, guitar and piano that will add some character and authenticity to your music performance. I’m no expert by any means……..but I want to give you some ideas from things that I’ve thought about and link you to teaching resources so that you can take your practice to the next level.