The Medicine of Salsa
A reflection from the last issue of the Journal of Music and Medicine caught my attention and I knew I had to share it! It is a poem and song written by Marjorie Jacobs.
Background
Marjorie Jacobs is a psychiatric rehabilitation practitioner at the Boston University Center for Psychiatric Rehabilitation where she designs and teaches promising group interventions to adults and young adults diagnosed with a serious mental illness….
Relaxing Music Recommended by Music Therapists
Music is for many a self-prescribed method of relaxation. Listening to relaxing music is a simple way to engage your mind in other activities and allow yourself to decompress. Many of us instinctively know that and we are drawn to music to seek destress and relaxation.
[Scroll down for the list of relaxing music and links.]
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Are “Music Therapy” Videos on YouTube Actually Music Therapy?
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Art Therapy: An Outside the Box Approach to ADHD
Parents of children who have an ADHD diagnosis often go to great lengths to support their child’s special needs. Behavior modifications, endless adjustments to diet and schedule, tutoring, sports, meetings with teachers, and medications create a short list. However, this does not come anywhere close to painting an adequate picture. Exhaustion, meltdowns, and desperation become underlying motivations to solve the puzzle that has become their child….
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Art Games for the Win!
We have all been there. You need a quiet and engaging activity for your kids to prevent a meltdown at a restaurant. Or quite possibly you have a sick family member that needs your presence but lacks the energy to converse. Maybe you are in a relationship that is experiencing a communication slump or your quiet child needs ideas for how to make new friends….
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Music Therapy Does Wonders for The Older Population!
At Sam’s Fans, we support music and art therapy mainly for children with seriously ill children and their families. Nevertheless, music therapy is also great for other populations. In this blog post, we will introduce the idea about music therapy for the older population.
Introduction
The UN adopted the United Nations Principles for Older Persons in 1991,…
Art Therapy: How It Works
“My loveness makes my wings grow big!”
As he spoke, he created pink circles radiating outward from his body map. This exercise is done each art therapy session to help this 6 year old learn to identify the physical sensations of his emotions. Gradually, his circles grew so large they overtook the page. Next, he added large,…
Music Therapy with Actual Heartbeats!
In a Facebook live conversation with music therapist Brian Schreck, we talked about a really cool music therapy intervention. It is music therapy with actual heartbeats! There is no technical term for it, but we can refer to it as “heartbeat music therapy.” The basic concept is to record the heartbeat of patients, which then can be edited,…
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Music Therapy in the Wake of 9/11
This day we remember September 11, 2001. Not being from the US and being too little when it happened, I cannot speak for what it must have been like to live through it. In this blog post, I would like to offer something else instead. This is a blog post on music therapy in the wake of 9/11 and how the music therapy community reacted to this horrible tragedy….
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Mat Kearney’s “On and On” Is Great for Music Therapy
Sam recorded the song “On and On” by Mat Kearney as a mother’s day gift for Nikki. This was an idea that Sam and her music therapist Brian Schreck had when she was at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. Apart from the fact that Nikki loves Mat Kearney, there are many reasons why the song “On and On” is great for music therapy….
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