How It Works: Music Therapy

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Recommended: Healing effects of music on mental health patients

“I think music in itself is healing. It's an explosive expression of humanity. It's something we are all touched by. No matter what culture we're from, everyone loves music” (Billy Joel). Although most listeners may not have the same technical experience in music as Billy Joel, it is easy enough to see the effect it has in a person's every day life. Music has the ability to pick us up when we are down, carry you back in time to a cherished memory, and transform silence into a symphony that can move one to tears. Music therapy is simply an application of the life that music creates. Music Therapy was first viewed as a practice in the United States during World War I and II with returning veterans who had lucidly incurable cases of shell shock. Nurses realized that playing music in the rooms of returning men often improved their mood, as well as their thought process and memory. This led to the creation of a Music Therapy undergraduate program at Michigan State University in 1944, and soon afterward, its first graduate program at the University of Kansas. As music therapy spread through out the world, not only in the curing of shell-shocked soldiers but in Parkinsons and Dementia patients, it became apparent that a larger organization would need to set the ground work for music therapy as a skill. In 1975, Australians became the first in the world to create the first music therapy organization call the Australian Music Therapy Association (AMTA). Twenty-three years later, the United States formed the American Music Therapy Association (AMTA). Music therapy works because of its three fundamentals: the application of systematic thinking through music theory, the creation of an individualized treatment plan, as well as the patie... ... middle of paper ... ...ted Jackson, Sherry. Telephone Interview. 26 Sept. 2011. Joel, Billy. “Music Quotes.” Brainy Quotes. Brainy Quotes, n.d. Web. 23 Sept. 2011. Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm von. “M&Mquotes.” Quotes. Quotes, n.d. Web. 29 Sept. 2011. “Music Therapy Depression” survivingdepression.net. SurvivingDepression, n.d. Web. 9 Sept. 2011 “Music Therapy for Depression” www2.cochrane.org. Cochrane Reviews, n.d. Web. 9 Sept. 2011 O'Conner, Gavin, Dir. Warrior. Perf. Tom Hardy, Nick Nolte, Joel Edgerton. Lionsgate, 2011. DVD. Scott, Elizabeth, M.S. “Music and Your Body: How Music Affects Us and Why Music Therapy Promotes Health”. About.com. About.com, n.d. Web. 28 Sept. 2011. Sacks, Oliver. Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain. New York: Knopf, 2007. Print. Zemeckis, Robert, Dir. Forrest Gump. Perf. Tom Hanks, Robin Wright, Gary Sinise. Paramount Pictures, 1994. DVD.

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