Music was far from the dust of everyday life.
~ Red Auerbach
We all know that music can make us feel better, reduce stress, helps us remember and experience good times, creates mood and soothes the soul. Psychologists report that music really affects the body - fast rates invariably increase your pulse, breathing and blood pressure, slow music reduces them and helps us relax. To quote William Congreve: “Music has charms to soothe a wild beast, soften stones, or bend an oak with a knot.” Hal A. Lingerman once said: “Just as certain choices of music will nourish your physical body and your emotional layer, so other pieces of music will bring you more weight.”
The idea of music as a curative influence that can affect health and behavior is as eternal as the writings of Aristotle and Plato. The 20th century American discipline began after World War I and World War II when community musicians of all types, both amateurs and professionals, went to veterans' hospitals across the country to play for thousands of veterans who suffer from physical and emotional traumas. from wars. Patients with noticeable physical and emotional reactions and an overall improvement in music led the hospitals to hire musicians in hospitals.
It soon became apparent that hospital musicians need advance preparation before entering the facility, and therefore the demand for a college curriculum. In 1944, the world's first music therapy degree program was founded at Michigan State University. The American Music Therapy Association (AMTA) was founded in 1998 as the union of the National Association for Music Therapy and the American Association for Music Therapy. AMTA promotes an enormous amount of research into the benefits of music as a therapy through the publication of Music Therapy, Music Therapy Perspectives and other sources.
Recent scientific studies show that melodies can resolve strong emotional responses in the same areas of the brain that are also stimulated by food and sex. These are the same melodies that simultaneously produce "chills" or "send a shiver along the back."
Ann Blood (Massachusetts General Hospital) and Robert Zatorr (McGill University) used positron emission tomography or PET scans to determine the exact areas of the brain that are stimulated by music. Previous studies have linked the midbrain, ventral striatum and portions of the cortex with food and sex, this study has shown that music stimulated these same areas. According to the Blood, these reactions to music are very individualized and based on culture. Some people may react to rock and roll. a roll just as the other can answer Beethoven. Ahhh, the magic of music!
Who can benefit from music therapy?
The clinical use of music has proven to be beneficial for children, adolescents, adults and the elderly, taking into account mental health needs, development, and learning disabilities. Alzheimer's disease and other aging-related conditions, substance abuse problems, brain injuries, physical disabilities, and acute and chronic pain, including mothers in labor, can also greatly benefit from music therapy.
Music therapists work in psychiatric hospitals, rehabilitation facilities, medical hospitals, outpatient clinics, day treatment centers, institutions serving people with disabilities, community psychiatric centers, anti-drug and alcohol programs, senior centers, nursing homes, hospitality programs, correctional institutions , halfway home, schools and even in private practice. Healthy people can use music to relieve stress through active music, such as a drum, as well as passive listening for relaxation.
Music is often a vital support for exercise, such as aerobics. Fast rhythmic music stimulates us - it motivates us to exercise faster and harder. Relaxing music that helps in childbirth and childbirth can also be included in this category, since pregnancy is considered a normal part of the life cycle of women.
Music is also used in hospitals for: pain relief in combination with anesthesia or painkillers: raise patients; mood and opposition to depression stimulate movement for physical rehabilitation, calm or soothe, often cause sleep, counteract fear or fear and muscle tension for relaxation, including the autonomic nervous system. In nursing homes, music can be used with older people to increase or maintain their physical, mental, social, and emotional functioning. Sensory and intellectual stimulation of music often helps to maintain a person’s quality of life.
Music therapy has also proved very useful for people with mental health problems: explore personal feelings, make positive changes in mood and emotional states, feel control over life through successful experiences, solve problem problems and resolve conflicts leading to stronger family and equal relationships. .
Excerpts from the author’s book: “Mountains and Rivers: Your Alternative Healthcare Supplement.”
ISBN 1-4033-8672-2
