Therapeutic Musicians and Music Therapists have different tasks and approaches.

Therapeutic Musicians:

1. attend and graduate from accredited programs of the National Standards Board for Therapeutic Musicians;
2. play live musicat a patient's bedside or in other healthcare environments;
3. create a unique music offering for a patient, with the intention to create a healing environment;
4. The patient is not required to directly participate, and can simply relax and respond to the music in their own way.

Music Therapists:

1. graduate from academidc programs at the BA, MA and PhD levels, and are board-certified;
2. work closely with the medical orders of physicians to create an individualized program to rehabilitate a patient to accomplish particular goals;
3. patients working with Music Therapists actively participate in their rehabilitation.

From the web site of the (Canadian Association of Music Therapy:)

"Music therapy is a discipline in which Certified Music Therapists (MTAs) use music purposefully within therapeutic relationships to support development, health, and well-being. Music therapists use music safely and ethically to address human needs within cognitive, communicative, emotional, musical, physical, social, and spiritual domains." u

What Does a Clinical Musician Do?

A Clinical Musician uses the natural elements of live music and sound to enhance the environment for patients in healthcare settings. Most often the music is offered at the bedside in a very gentle and unobstrusive manner. The Clinical Musician will obtain permission to play music, but patients are not required to participate or interact unless they wish to do so.

Clinical Musicians do not consider themselves entertainers or performers. Our intention is to serve each patient with prescriptive music, with the intention to facilitate physical, emotional, mental and spiritual healing.

A Clinical Musician will assess the patient and the situation in order to provide suitable music choices. Sometimes this may involve improvising freely to create a space for deep relaxation or reduction of anxiety. Sometimes we choose familiar tunes gently woven to create a cradle of comforting melodies. Music is created in the moment - tempo and music style is based on what the patient is experiencing at the moment.

Benefits of live music

In my experience, patients are initially surprised, and later delighted by a therapeutic musician's visit. Many people have never seen a harp or a handpan in person and are quite taken with these instruments. Patients react differently; some hum along or sing; others close their eyes and fall asleep as I play (I consider this a great compliment!). With live music, residents receive the benefit of hearing the full spectrum of sound and vibration near them. Repertoire selections can easily be modified to suit individual preferences and situations.

I primarily work with the theory of Resonance - each of us has a fundamental tone or frequency in our bodies. I attempt to discover what that frequency is, tune my instrument to that frequency (key), and slowly improvise. If there are medical devices present that omit tones, I weave the rhythm and pitch of those tones (called "Double Resonance") into the musicial offering to soften their impact. My goal is to reduce and distractions by making them part of the music.

Qualifications of a Therapeutic Musician

Therapeutic Musicians complete a program certified by the National Standards Board for Therapeutic Musicians (NSBTM) with online and in-person study, and supervised internships. The NSBTM is comprised of "leaders in the therapeutic music field who have joined together to develop and maintain standards for therapeutic musician training programs and their graduates." Graduates are then required to engage in professional development activities by attending conferences, workshops, lectures and webinars on a variety of approved topics relevant to the field of therapeutic music. Continuing Education Units (CEU’s) are awarded for these efforts.

Code of Ethics

In 2007 the NSBTM developed and published a Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct for therapeutic musicians. All Certified Clinical Musicians agree to conduct themselves in accordance with these principles.

My thanks to Anne Crosby Gaudet who provided some of the basic concepts for this page and has allowed me to include my own thoughts here.