Sound Matters Music Therapy, LLC
Serving adults with developmental disability in Minneapolis, MN
I had a fantastic night with a certain client. He crossed midline with ease, he tracked a little better than is normal, he remained seated for the amount of time as is his goal, and he passed his instruments off to me with essentially no prompting.
And, this client is all smiles.
I love what I get to do.
I’m not too interested in karaoke (I think I sing and play other people’s music enough as it is), but one Ray Evangelista certainly is. A story was broadcast on Minnesota Public Radio tonight — apparently there are people who have gone to see him for ten years straight. He calls his version of karaoke “enhanced.”
Find the whole story here. 
Though this isn’t exactly music therapy related, this post is my therapy related.
For my birthday, my fiancé Thomas had the perfect idea to purchase tickets to four different modern dance performances throughout this season. After the first performance a few months ago (of the Zenon Dance Company), I was inspired to go to an “open dance class.” I decided the word “open,” and the words directly under that text on the flier, “open to anyone,” meant that I, having taken some modern and some jazz back in the day, would be able to attend the class.
Best $10.00 workout I’ve ever had. I was sore in every part of my being for a week.
Turns out the words “open” and “open to anyone” didn’t quite include me. However, I absolutely loved being in a dance space with real dancers.
We went to a Breaking Boundaries Dance Company performance tonight. Enter my therapy. I have always loved dance, but never so much as to attend more than one performance in, say, five years (they’re pricey). I have to acknowledge that my discovery of one of my favorite artists, Tom Waits, was at a dance performance back in college. I saw a dance choreographed to “God’s Away on Business,” and I won’t ever forget it. For a few months following, I was consumed by Tom Waits, and that particular song.
My point is simply that I am fascinated by this other art form. I love the physicality of the music. I love that I have no idea what the story is, most of the time, and that I don’t have to figure it out. I adore how dance activates and agitates me.
Stupendous.
I remember a time only a while ago, maybe only a couple of weeks, where I proclaimed that I was making progress toward goals with one of my private clients. Tonight, however, I feel that the one step forward we’d made has disintegrated and my grasp on the best approach to working with this client has faltered.
I had had a certain amount of success engaging this person with providing a list of experiences that he and I would target during the session, and ask that he put them in order based on his preference. (Thanks, Lynn, for this awesome tip.) Tonight, the client seemed just as willing as he has been to arrange an order of experiences for his session, but essentially refused to participate in them. I feel that I floundered in his session tonight, and that, again, I don’t have enough tools to utilize for him. Yet. I have to have some sort of hope that I will acquire them. And patience. Uch. Patience. I have trouble with that.
Tonight I essentially made my fiancé sit with me for more than an hour as we waded through a couple of years’ worth of my home video. The reason I suddenly decided to do this was that he and I had just returned from meeting a potential wedding photographer, and I wanted to prove to him that I haven’t always loathed being in front of a camera and/or camcorder.
When I was really little, my family got together and performed Christmas concerts for one another. There was a section of video that caught me attempting to play my teeny violin, but complaining that “I can’t hold it up,” and “I can’t do this.” My mom sat there next to me, encouraging me. I believe I lasted a minute, and then just stalked away (a graceful child I was not).
My mother is the most patient person there is.
Thanks for your perseverance, Mom.
I am excited that I now will be offering guitar lessons (both adaptive and traditional) through the studio where I have been offering solely music therapy sessions. My first student will start next week.
I have experienced my first private client’s leaving. I have seen her on a bi-weekly basis since June, and her last session with me was last week. I have a variety of paperwork to write up surrounding her treatment termination. Is there anyone out there who is willing to share some templates?
On February 7, a group of us will get together to report on articles of our choice. Some of these are:
I am tired. Sometimes I’m just tired.
More than a year ago, I had the thought that I’d like to conduct a research study. I began “informally” gathering data and study participants. My topic was much more so for the sake of my own curiosity surrounding perfectionism in musical performance and whether or not, for other people as myself, the ability to learn non-musical tasks was affected.
Now I’d like to research range of movement in residents of skilled nursing facilities or assisted living facilities, and whether or not it is improved with use of specific music. There is much to read, I know.
Has anyone launched a study that might be more “informal” and likely not published like my first idea? How did it go?
Does anyone else actually want to publish (and doesn’t know where to start)?