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What is a Music Therapist?

Christine Wineberg

If I had a dollar for every time I told someone that I’m a music therapist and they looked at me with a furrowed brow and asked, “Music Therapy?  What’s that?”  I would have at least enough to pay for my next plane ticket to attend a conference. 

There are approximately 4,000 music therapists in the U.S. and it’s only at these music therapy conferences where I can be assured that someone won’t look at me as if I’ve just invented a make-believe job.  Music Therapy can be defined for what it isn’t almost as much as what it actually is.  We aren’t music teachers adapting a lesson to accommodate a learning difference or a physical disability.  We aren’t designing specialized rehabilitative exercises like music-based occupational therapists or physical therapists.  We aren’t performers or diversionary entertainment. 

Here’s what a music therapist is: we are specifically trained to use music in order to reach non-musical goals.  We are psychotherapists who use music-based techniques to engage our clients in moving toward their goals.  Depending on what the client wants or needs these goals vary, but the relationship between the music therapist and the client is the central focus.  Students who study music therapy are required to master two fields: the helping profession of therapy and counseling and the music profession, becoming competent musicians across a variety of instruments, styles and genres.   

What music therapists do may seem familiar on the surface because at times it looks similar to music instruction or even like two musicians enjoying a jam session.  What the therapist is really doing is assessing and reacting to the client’s musical, verbal and non-verbal communication.  What the therapist notices in the client’s musical responses gives insight into their psychological process and then informs the therapist’s response.  In order to use music as a tool, the therapist sometimes departs from their own training to create aesthetically beautiful music to facilitate a beautifully useful musical relationship.   They understand the value of strumming through a song out of rhythm and with awkward pauses for a client who is struggling to assert their independence and doing it through accompanying themselves as they sing through a song with personal meaning.   Music therapists are trained to use music significantly.  They know how to make an improvisational experience safe for an anxious client who is just starting to explore using her voice in a group and how to help her bring that experience into words so that she gains some insight into her accomplishment.  Success is sometimes subtle, but the persistent presence of the therapist over time is what maintains the momentum. 

I suppose if what we did was less complex we wouldn’t have such a difficult time describing what we do, but then it wouldn’t be as adaptable as it is.   

As a board certified music therapist practicing for sixteen years I have seen the field grow and change, but one thing remains constant for me, the satisfaction of witnessing my client’s growth and the pure joy they express when they find their own voice.  This is why I will patiently continue to define, explain and describe what music therapy is to anyone who asks.

3 Responses to “What is a Music Therapist?”

1. Roia says:

   January 5, 2011 at 9:07 am

   Nicely put, Christine! And thank you for finding yet another way to nicely articulate what it is exactly that we do.

   Reply
2. Michael Warner says:

   January 5, 2011 at 6:08 pm

   Oliver Sacks book “musicophelia” makes clear that speech centers and music centers in the brain can work independently. A person with damaged speech may still have real capacity to be musical. I’m a muso, but not a therapist. I love Oliver Sacks work in Neurology. Anyway, just passing through. Michael.

   Reply
3. Noel Anderson says:

   May 31, 2011 at 2:40 am

   Love it Christine! My favorite line is, ” In order to use music as a tool, the therapist sometimes departs from their own training to create aesthetically beautiful music to facilitate a beautifully useful musical relationship.”

   That should be copyrighted! I’m putting that on my facebook!

   Reply