As musicians, we know that music can impact us personally in a variety of ways. It connects us with others, providing an immersive experience both as we listen and play. We know that music elicits a physiological response, thus being a medium through which we can hold or express ourselves psychologically and physically.
When I trained as a music therapist, I learned about the many different ways that we can use music to support people of all ages and abilities who have any communication, physical, social, relational, cognitive or emotional need. Breaking music down into its elemental form provides a tool through which music can be adapted and used throughout a therapy journey. It provides that non-invasive, safe outlet which can be used to process and externalise inner thoughts and feelings without having the pressure to put everything into words.
My therapeutic approach
When working with clients, I adapt the musical elements of the material I use to best meet the needs of that person or group. To give an example, this involves providing a regulating musical structure to help hold or contain difficult memories or feelings, to allow the person to feel they can share while being listened to and held (musically). At other times, this involves adapting my music to match the energy or sounds a client uses, to validate and participate alongside in what they share. The music can be used in different ways, and is adapted to meet the needs of each person.
As a Neurologic Music Therapist, I use a holistic approach, incorporating the techniques of Neurologic Music Therapy which use music to support functional outcomes. This is part of my toolkit, providing a way to work on practical skills required for everyday life, such as learning to speak again post-stroke by using singing and rhythm before transitioning to the spoken words. In addition, it means being able to create a space for free musical play to support emotional or psychological needs.
Communication and wellbeing
There are many different models of working within music therapy. My approach provides ways to facilitate and support communication (of all kinds) and wellbeing. But I am a firm believer that everyone can use music in their own therapeutic way, and it is important to me as a clinician that the benefits or strategies that are explored in therapy are accessible for clients to use in everyday life.
Over the last few years, in my role at BAMT, I've worked to support building partnerships and learning between different professions. Having worked previously in education, I have experienced first-hand the challenge of seeing children and young people engage with music in a therapeutic way, while being unable to provide time and space within the classroom to support this fully. This is why we now run ‘Communicating Through Music’ courses, specifically aimed at those working in education.
When you view communication (whether verbal or non-verbal) and wellbeing through a musical lens, the possibilities of how you can then use music to support these domains are endless. For example, verbal communication consists of pitch, melody, rhythm and pulse, but also silence. When we leave more silences, particularly predictable gaps, within musical play with others, we increase the opportunities for musical dialogues to happen.
This is based on how we learn to communicate as infants – research shows that babies essentially learn where the gaps are that a caregiver leaves during verbal exchanges and start to fill these with the use of gestures or voice. When it comes to wellbeing, music can boost our mood as we build personal connections with music which link directly to the autobiographical memory and emotional centres of our brains. But it can also depress our mood due to the capacity of our brains to link music to negative life experiences.
Therefore, learning about individual responses to music and how we can adapt this is key to supporting others who struggle to communicate, whether due to a physical condition or simply not having the vocabulary themselves. By being as educated as we can be on how we can use music as an accessible, non-invasive tool, I believe we can best support children and young people to navigate and grow through challenges in a safe way.
