An article for parents and teachers about what ways music has been and can be used therapeutically, as well as why and how music is able to facilitate these healing processes. Part 1 of a 4-part article.
by Dr. Arthur Harvey
Music has a major place in the lives of most children. It serves many purposes not only in their lives, and also ours as adults. Perhaps the most important purpose is its therapeutic and healing power.
This has become evident in the central role that music has played in the days since September 11, 2001, in national and community memorial services, tribute television shows, church services, and school and community events. Many new songs in a variety of styles are being shared via radio, television, local concerts and other gatherings, each growing out of the emotional turmoil we have been experiencing individually, and collectively as a nation.
A renewal of the singing of such "feeling charged" songs such as God Bless America, Amazing Grace, America the Beautiful, Bridge Over Troubled Waters, Let There Be Peace on Earth, This Land is Your Land, You'll Never Walk Alone, and many others is being experienced in our schools, at churches, at ball games, benefit concerts, and most communal gatherings.
A number of websites, such as the Healing Power of the Arts Website from the Colorado Council of the Arts (http://www.artslynx.org/heal) and The Arts and Healing Network Website (http://www.arthealrs.org) share ways that the arts are being used to assist individuals and communities in dealing with recent terrorist-related events. Many of the emails received in the past several weeks focus on ways that music and the other arts are vehicles for healing at a time like this.
Coincidentally, the September issue of Reader's Digest included an article entitled The Healing Power of Music. As parents and educators, it is important to know in what ways music has been and can be used therapeutically, as well as why and how music is able to facilitate these healing processes. The majority of material available through the public media is lacking an explanation of the processes involved, yet affirms that music has a powerful impact on all ages.
Most of us have heard quoted, misquoted, or partially quoted William Congreve's famous statement, "Music has charms to soothe a savage beast, To soften rock, or bend a knotted oak." Centuries earlier, Plato wrote that "Rhythm and harmony penetrate very deeply to the inward places of the soul, and affect is most powerfully, imparting grace." Victor Hugo poignantly stated that "Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent." Since music does charm us, penetrate deeply into our soul, and express that which cannot be said, this article has been written to provide for you an insight as to why and how music is able to provide therapeutic healing for individuals of all ages, and even a nation in mourning and shock.
To provide a perspective in examining what happens as we listen, create, and respond to music as it is processed and perceived by our brains, I will use a song from my childhood, "I'm IN-Right, OUT-Right, UP-Right, DOWN-Right Happy All the Time" as a framework to examine why music is and can be such an important part of our personal and collective healing process. IN-Music has the power to "get into us" through our ears, skin, and bones. The hearing sense is the first sense to develop in utero, the last sense to go at the end of life, and the only one we cannot shut off, or completely close down. Even under anesthesia, the auditory system continues to receive messages, which are stored in memory.
Music can penetrate into all levels of our mind--conscious, preconscious, and subconscious (a paradigm or construct developed by Freud, with transpersonal psychology suggesting that we also have a supraconsciousness), into all three levels of our brain-cerebral, limbic, and brain stem, and into both hemispheres of our cerebral neocortex, thus affecting all of our systems.
As music is received into the ear it initiates a brain process that has an effect not only upon our Central Nervous System, Autonomic Nervous System, and Peripheral Nervous System, but also in turn, our Endocrine System, Immune System, Cardio-vascular System, Respiratory System, and our Skeletal-Musculature System. The response of the brain and body to music is determined by a variety of factors, with four musical elements causing the major effects: loudness, tempo, degrees of dissonance and consonance, and timbre.
Part 2: Music Impacts all Parts of our Bodies
Part 3: The Positive Effect of Music
Part 4: Music Can Help Manage Stress Levels
FastBack:
Send Us Your Feedback
