FAQs for Students
I receive a lot of email requests from students who want to learn more about music therapy, either for a research project or for career exploration. I love talking to students and supporting their interests, but I find myself spending time writing lengthy responses and never receiving a follow up. So this blog post is to answer many of the FAQs I receive from students. And if you read it and then have more specific questions, please feel free to reach out again and ask them!
What Is Music Therapy?
This one is pretty easy to research, but I would also refer you to our certifying organization, CBMT, where you can read about the training and standards for Board Certified Music Therapists.
What Does A Music Therapist Do?
The work looks different based on the people with whom we’re working. With someone recovering from a brain injury, we'll use singing to regain speech and rhythmic stimulation to work on walking with a steadier gait. With a person with physical disabilities, we'll use instrument playing to motivate movement - piano, for fine motor, or drumset for gross motor like a kick drum. In the ICU, we use entrainment to relax a patient who may be unable to participate but is in a state of stress (matching music to heart or breath rate and then adjusting music and body rhythm follows it). With patients who have a new cancer diagnosis, we'll make playlists that help get them through treatments and then discuss song lyrics or write our own in order to explore and express emotions. When someone has asthma or CF, we'll do breathing exercises to music (even hip hop or country) to increase lung capacity.
How Do You Become a Music Therapist?
There are a lot of paths to take to study music therapy. I went to undergrad at USM for percussion performance, and took prerequisite courses in psychology and development, knowing I was going to apply to grad schools. Then I got a master in music psychotherapy, with a certificate in neurologic music therapy.
After school, music therapists have to pass the board certification exam, which includes written information on music theory, etc. and then passing through basic skills on guitar, piano, and voice. This can be intimidating but school prepares everyone really well, so by the time the exam comes it doesn't feel like a big deal!
What Should I Do To Prepare for Auditioning and Applying to Music Therapy School?
As far as admission to music therapy school, it's a good idea to do some reading on music therapy and look into different kinds of programs so you have an idea of what you want. There are schools that focus more in neurologic music therapy, or behavioral music therapy, or the psychoemotional side of things. I chose NYU because it was an overview of all of it and had great hands-on internship experiences. But there are really interesting programs all over the country.
What Do You Like About Your Career?
The things I love most about the work are:
1. Being able to engage in creativity and music throughout the work day, in a structured and helpful way.
2. The opportunity to work with- and see big changes in- people who would likely never sign up for music therapy (an example of this I always joke about is the 'grumpy old Mainer', who scoffs at the idea of music in stroke rehab but then benefits greatly and sooner or later is crying while singing his wedding song after not speaking for months, etc)
3. The diversity of the work- I am focused on medical music therapy, but I was one of two music therapists in Maine when I first moved back (now we have over 20!). In NYC, I trained at Beth Israel and then worked at Sloan Kettering, and we had six music therapists on the integrative medicine team. It's taken a long time to get things off the ground in healthcare in Maine. Because of that, I've worked in a lot of different settings through grant-funded programs. I've done music discussion/songwriting groups in corrections facilities, a women's song share and health education program for HIV/AIDS prevention (with new Mainers who all spoke different languages), music and memory groups at nursing homes and on our geri psych unit, research on wind instruments/singing for people with lung cancer and asthma, and lots of other things. I have colleagues who work only in schools or only in community day programs. There is so much opportunity and such a huge need.
The things I find difficult about the work:
1. It takes a lot of education and advocacy to get programs started; there are a lot of misconceptions that music therapy is teaching lessons (that's music education), singing songs to people in hospitals (that's performing), or using bowls to work with chakras (that's yoga, or 'sound healing'). Thankfully, research is changing that - and I love data so I like research!
2. The work can be emotionally taxing. I spend a lot of time in end-of-life care, but that's not even what weighs heavily on me. It's seeing the gaps in services for folks with disabilities who are trying to live independently. Sometimes the music therapist will be the most stable provider in a person's home/life because there is such a high turnover of support staff and that person may not qualify for other therapies anymore. Because of this, I spend a lot of my non-clinical hours advocating and in legislative work (not for music therapy, but for disability rights).
What Is Your Day to Day Like?
Most of my day is seeing clients, which means I spend a lot of time being present and listening and responding - both musically and verbally - to the folks with whom I work. I try to start the day with vocal warmups and stretches, since I may end up singing a lot or playing a guitar while standing in awkward positions in a hospital room. I try to fit in a walk. I have to take notes of sessions and keep records for each person, and respond to phone calls and emails. Because I have a private practice, which is a small business, I also have to take care of all of my accounting, marketing, business registration, and media/communications.
What Is Your Week Like?
I spend two days at the hospital doing inpatient work, two days at my office seeing individuals, and one day is a flexible one where I drive to clients who are unable to leave their home, and sometimes go to a clinic to work in outpatient treatment.
Are There Related Careers I Should Consider?
There are related fields, and always the possibility to incorporate music into other healing professions. I've done a lot of trainings for social workers, PTs, OTs, and others to help them get comfortable using music to address goals. I also am involved with the study of soundscapes and the impact of noise on environmental health (human and nonhuman). There are so many aspects to and elements of music that you could study.