Wednesday, March 08, 2006

Music healing/Musicmedicine/Music Therapy

What is the difference between music healing and music therapy? Or music healing and music medicine? It's pretty subtle actually and different people would definte each discipline or methodology differently. These are MY definitions today:

First of all, healing does not mean curing. Healing has to do with decreasing symptoms, physically, physiologically, psychologically, emotionally, or spiritually.

Music healing is the process of using already composed music in a passive (listening) or active (singing, playing an instrument) way to ameliorate symptoms and help a person to feel better. Music healing has a spiritual component; not religious but spiritual.

Music therapy is now a well-established discipline which is evidence-based and often used in rehabilitation settings. Many hospitals, nursing homes and clinics employ music therapists. one can get college degrees in music therapy and if you want to be in that field, it is a requirement.

4 comments:

Alice H. Cash said...

I do believe that many people use music therapy, music healing, and music medicine interchangeably. What do YOU think?

Alice H. Cash said...

Music therapy is one of the many sound therapies. Sound can be created by humans, by machines, or even by nature. Some would call wind, waves, crickets chirping and birds singing, the music of nature. What do you think?

Alice H. Cash said...

Music and sound can elicit every emotion imaginable. Recently we have had repeated severe thunderstorms. With the first flash of lightning and the slightest rumble of thunder. My pooch and my friend run for the basement. I would say that probably 85-90% of this is conditioning. Past history for them has included damaging storms with wind and hail, power outages, even bodily harm. Isn't it a good thing that Mother Nature has arranged a warning system for us when storms are nearby?

Of course these are sounds (and sights) that tend to have negative connotations, but the end result is positive because we can choose to find a safe location to ride out the storm. Please tell me about how sounds of nature have been healing or life-saving to you.

Alice H. Cash said...

People are funny about the credentials they trust, value, expect, etc. Recently I was on TV here in Louisville, being intereviewed about the power of drumming and the benefits of drumming. The newscaster said clearly that I am a clinical musicologist and a licensed therapist. At no point did I say that I am a "music therapist," because only people with a degree in music therapy can claim that distinction. I do, however, have a Bachelor's degree in piano performance, a Master's degree in piano performance, and Ph.D. in musicology and a MSSW in clinical social work.

A local music therapist wrote in to the TV station and said she was upset because they "implied" that I am a music therapist.

I am baffled by this. Comments?