The Best of What Was There

Drum Circle

First day of classes. I led a drum circle this morning to start the Creative Arts Therapy Orientation session. I'm certainly not an expert in doing this, but I can get everyone involved. I had great success with drumming as a therapeutic activity when I worked in a county jail; the cooperation, sharing, and listening necessary helped the inmates grow in those skills without my ever having to mention them explicitly.

A "drum" circle can involve other instruments, and out of our 40 participants this morning, there were several playing maracas and other shakers, others playing claves, guiros, and slit drums, and two people on bells. The choice of instruments can be important. Some people feel anxious about trying to keep a steady beat and a shaker is easier. Some instruments are easy to play but don't work -- we have a large gourd cabasa that, when you play it, drowns everything else out.

One of the useful aspects of a drum circle at an orientation is that, while some people may initially feel uncomfortable, the act of making it work and trying to get better creates a bond. It loosens up everyone and then the actual meet-and-greet is much more productive.

Dr. King!

I traveled to Kansas this week, defended my dissertation ("Attention to Changes in Chord Complexity by Non-Musicians: An ERP Study"), and am now "Dr. King!" When I came to teach at Nazareth College ABD (All But Dissertation), I knew it would be a challenge to finish in a year, but thanks to tremendous support from everyone at both schools, I'm done!

Uh oh!

Charles Castleman, old friend and teacher from The Quartet Program lured me onto Facebook yesterday.  Today I have a profile and friends and I have a feeling I should be afraid, very afraid.  I'm joined to the internet at the hip already and I can't keep up here; how on earth will I manage something else?

However, I put the link to this blog on my profile to force an update.  So, here goes:

My first year at Nazareth College has been wonderful.  The faculty and staff here have been welcoming and supportive and I feel completely at home.  I'm already a part of the team at our on-campus interdisciplinary clinic and have had some wonderful experiences co-treating -- and supervising students -- in the Aphasia Clinic.   In February, faculty members from physical therapy, speech therapy, art therapy, social work, nursing, and music therapy all went to Colorado and went through the NMT training.  It was an interesting experience which I will try to post about soon.

I'm beginning to meet and visit the numerous music therapists in the Rochester area, and I've been involved with the Music and Cognition Symposiums run by the U. of Rochester, Eastman School of Music, and Cornell University.  I love where I'm living and so does Mackenzie!

Thanks to the great support here, I was able to finish my dissertation in a year and I will defend it Monday the 20th in Kansas.  Last time I checked, the title was "Attention to Changes in Chord Complexity: An ERP Study."   There will certainly be an update here when and if "Dr. King" arrives back in Rochester.  Until then...

She's Back!

Sorry for the interruption -- I had to interview for a job, take the job, finish three research projects, pack up, and move cross-country!  I'm now happily ensconced as the new addition to the Music Therapy division at Nazareth College in Rochester, NY.  No, really!

There were several things that attracted me to this job, and lured me into taking their offer knowing that I'd have to finish my dissertation long-distance.  First, the music therapy program is well-established, having been at Nazareth for 25 years. They've just added a master's degree, which is why they added a professor.  Second, the school has several related master's and PhD programs: art therapy, speech/language pathology, physical therapy, social work, and nursing -- and most of those programs have functioning clinics on campus -- and are ready, willing and able to work with music therapy.  Third, the college is small and class sizes are as well.  This gives teachers the opportunity to mentor as well as teach: something that was important to me.

Finally, the job gave me the opportunity to live somewhere I'd like.  Rochester is a Great Lakes city, sitting just south of Lake Ontario.  The Genessee River runs through it, as does the Erie Canal.  Lots and lots of water, which I'd been missing.  Four seasons (yes, lots of winter, but not below-zero winter) and old neighborhoods and just the right size.

So I'm settling in, teaching and planning...and keeping my eye on the ball, which -- in this case -- is a defense of my dissertation next summer.  The Amazing Nine-Month Dissertation!  We'll see. :-)

Regional Conference - Research Focus

I must be a PhD candidate, because I just returned from our regional music therapy conference, and my two presentations focused not on my usual topics -- teaching clinicians -- but on Serious Research Projects.   More than that: I loved it.  It is such a privilege, at this point in my life, to be able to focus on questions I've had for years. 

For example, I've just finished an article about a content analysis of articles from our primary research journals.  Depending on their philosophical backgrounds, music therapists tend to write for publication in two entirely different ways: one group emphasizing quantitative research and results; and the other group emphasizing the process of therapy -- qualitative research without a need to find definitive outcomes.  This dichotomy reflects debates within the profession.

Certainly, some music therapists are doing rigorous experimental research that should be expressed in a form and in words that parallel research articles for other health sciences.  This kind of writing will earn us respect from colleagues and advance the profession's ability to be funded and otherwise supported.  But what about the music?  Reviewing the way music therapy authors write when they are not bound to the peer-reviewed journal format, I found that they all express their feelings about music with passion and vivid language.  Yet once these same authors are writing a research article, most of the emotional, creative, joyous tone about music (for themselves or their clients) is lost.  Should we be so concerned about our acceptance from other professions that we fail to express what is unique about what we do?

Most importantly, I think there is a middle ground that many of my peers in music therapy have found between the two main "schools" of music therapy -- an eclectic style that incorporates both behavioral, data-based planning, and improvisational, creative sessions.  Is it possible for the music therapy "discourse community" to begin to accept writing that reflects both elements of practice, especially as more and more music therapists practice in a diverse way?

My other presentation at conference was on my primary area of research: harmony.  I presented some of my research questions to the people who attended my session and found that the clinicians had similar experiences and opinions to mine -- and they all expressed enthusiasm for research that might validate things we all "know."

These are some of the questions I shared:

• Does a V7 chord help cue a client to respond on the tonic?*
• Do major 7th chords, or those with added notes (6ths, 9ths) promote a higher level of arousal in a listener than basic 1-3-5 chords?
• Do suspensions, anticipations, and changing tones provide needed interest, or unwanted distraction?
• What different harmonic choices do we make depending on our clinical goals?

*Every music therapist in the room answered as I do: emphatically "YES."  Yet there is no physiologically/neurologically-based research that confirms this, and there should be.  I'm excited about the prospect of providing some of that through my dissertation.  Plus, the two studies I'm doing now will provide a great deal of "pilot" information for years of research on this topic.  I'm excited.

 

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