THE POWERFUL INFLUENCE OF MUSIC IN THERAPEUTIC HEALING: BY DAVID OLUMATI NWANGUMA, IN FELICITATION WITH PROF. ALVAN-IKOKU NWAMARA OF NNAMDI AZIKIWE UNIVERSITY

 Music has remained an outstanding developmental tool that has consistently cut across centuries from the medieval to the 21st century. Music has been used in various cultures and regions of the world for rituals, healing, entertainment, education, uplifting, relaxation, admonition and in divers developmental skills. it is practically impossible to undo the mysteries associated with musical development. because over time music has proven to be the best therapeutic tool. 

Many years before therapeutic music became a discipline of study, the old medicine men, traditional healers in various societies used music as a healing tool. they were aware of the curative power of music and used it effectively to directly administer healing on people. 

Asklepios a mythical priest-physician worshiped as a demigod in Greece also used the healing powers of music, he was later called Aesculapius in Rome, the gods of medicine. 

the healing concept of music has been found in many literature s dating back from the old Egypt and Greece. 

Pythagoras also specifically assigned some intervals and musical modes to be used for healing. 

From Biblical stories we have also learned that the music of David was a healing tool for Saul. 

from long time ago, musicians have been trying to use music for the healing of mental disorders especially As milieu therapy began to be introduced into psychiatric hospitals (Jones, 1953),  New therapeutic methods where  being innovated.

The first academic program to train music therapists was developed and instituted at Michigan State University in 1944. Long time ago right? 

Music heals faster and remains better and more effective especially in younger children and older people. 

Music is used to keep children focused as every aspect of music demands focus and great concentration especially when you have to practice any musical instrument. 

practicing instruments have proven repeatedly and assuredly as a tool to refocus peoples attention and encourage self awareness by improving memory category and developing the inmost abilities of using the mind. 

Music practices has also proven to offer help to people suffering from-different forms of isolation based on the proven fact that  music would prompt socialization and improve self confidence as individual (s) learn and practice their skills on various instruments. 

Training For Music Therapists 

The Music therapist is trained critically in skills that propels him or her to practice effectively. apart from being versatile in musical instruments assigned for such roles as healing, they are also demanded to practice in a clinical setting which makes them fit and able to work in the hospitals across the world. 

The therapist on training is expected to attend courses in musicianship, behavioral sciences, and theories of psychiatry and psychotherapy, as well as clinical experience as a music therapy intern. It is a multidisciplinary study.  

A music therapist must show competencies in the following areas: 

Musical Foundations

Music theory and history

Composition and arranging skills

Major performance medium skills

Keyboard, voice, and guitar skills

Non symphonic instrumental skills

Improvisational skills (instrument and vocal)

Conducting skills

Movement skills

Clinical Foundations

Exceptionalism

Principles of therapy

The therapeutic relationship

Music Therapy

Foundations and principles

Client assessment

Treatment planning

Therapy implementation

Therapy evaluation

Documentation

Termination /discharge planning

Professional role /ethics

Interdisciplinary collaboration

Supervision and administration

Research methods

General Education

Electives

Therapy, from the Greek therapeia, is fundamentally the rendering of a health-giving service. 

When the term therapy is applied to the treatment of mental, psychological, and behavioral disorders, it becomes interchangeable with the term psychotherapy and covers a variety of modern therapeutic and psycho-therapeutic approaches (Binder, Binder, & Rimland, 1976).

Music therapy can be considered a psycho-therapeutic process in as much as it is a form of treatment...... in which a trained person deliberately establishes a professional relationship with the object of removing, modifying, or retarding existing symptoms, of mediating disturbed patterns of behavior, and of promoting positive personality growth and development (Wolberg, 1954, P 8). 

At this point when people are prone to stress, family challenges, fatigue problems, mental issues, loneliness of adult parents whom children are busy following their dreams, a time when life has become a selfish struggle, all man for himself: 

We call for the use of music, therapeutic Music for healing has proven beyond doubt an effective healing approach without any side effects, healing naturally, restoring memories lost and effecting a permanent healing. 

Music therapy is an amalgam of music and therapy. When music, as an agent of change, is used to establish a therapeutic relationship, to nurture a person’s growth and development, to assist in self-actualization, the process is music therapy. In this process, music is consciously used for the enhancement of living, being, and becoming. 

Broadly defined, music therapy is the use of music as a therapeutic tool for the restoration, maintenance, and improvement of psychological, mental, and physiological health and for the habilitation, rehabilitation, and maintenance of behavioral, developmental, physical, and social skills—all within the context of a client therapist relationship. A nonverbal treatment modality that is applicable to both the verbal and nonverbal person, it serves those of a wide age range and with a wide diversity of disorders. It can be a diagnostic aid (Nordoff & Robbins, 1971, 1977) and can reinforce other treatment modalities. 

Benefits of Healing With Music 

💝Music is a cross-cultural mode of expression

💝The nonverbal nature of music makes it a universal means of communication 

💝Music is unique in its power to penetrate the mind and body directly, whatever the individual’s level of intelligence or health need. As such, it stimulates the senses, evokes feelings and emotions, elicits physiological and mental responses, and energizes the mind and body.

💝Its intrinsic structure and qualities have the potential for self organization of the individual and organization of the group.

💝Music influences musical and non-musical behavior.

💝Music facilitates learning and skills acquisition.

💝It is an eminently functional, adaptable, and aesthetic modality applicable to all client populations.

The overall goals of treatment through the therapeutic use of music are 

(a) to effect personal change

(b) to facilitate interpersonal relations

(c) to nourish growth and development

(d) to contribute to the attainment of self-actualization, and 

(e) to assist the individual’s entry into society.  

Music therapy is both an art and a science. Art and science are acts of discovery, imagination, and inspiration that give rise, on one hand, to symbolic and aesthetic expression and, on the other, to verifiable and investigative expression. “Both … give a fresh world view, reslice the universe in a different way, and both are human creations” (Gerard, 1958, p. 1).

Music therapy is rooted in participation, in actively making music, whether repeating a rhythmic pattern on a drum or playing a Bach fugue, singing isolated words of a song or performing a Verdi aria, blowing one note on a flutophone or weaving a Gluck melody on a flute. To understand the immediacy of the multi-sensory effect of music on the organism is to understand the fundamental meaning and beauty of this mode of treatment (Alvin, 1966). In the very act of making music and responding to musical stimuli, a person experiences instantaneous psychological and physiological sensations on many levels. The concrete reality of sensing auditorily, visually, tactually, kinesthetically, and emotionally brings the person into the present and has immediate results (Anderson, 1977). Because of mental, physical, or psychological dysfunction, however, experiencing is sometimes on a subliminal, or unconscious, level. Through music therapy strategies and techniques, the therapist aims to bring this experiencing to consciousness, to open up lines of communication, in the broadest sense, by awakening, heightening, and expanding awareness (Boxill, 1981).

Yes, music can still be that tool for healing every mental, emotional, or behavioral disorders. In music comfort can be found for the young old and to all the corners of the world Music speaks love, unity and healing.