Music and Soulmaking: Toward a New Theory of Music Therapy

by Barbara J. Crowe

This resource explores fascinating new avenues in music therapy. The author discusses connections between music therapy and theorizes that every little nuance found in nature is part of a dynamic system in motion. She also shows how everything is inter-related and addresses how music is able to touch people in a deep and consequentially healing way.

This complex interaction results in what the author terms "Soulmaking", or the ability of music to heal what makes us vital, whole, alive, and balanced. Crowe draws upon her 25 years of experience as a music therapist to flesh out her theory of soulmaking, providing concrete examples of the effect music can have on a wide range of patients with diseases as varied as Alzheimer's and Down's Syndrome. She also addresses the four facets of human mind, body, emotion, and spirit and shows how music can touch them all.

436 pages, Hardcover

First published January 28, 2004

Reviews

[Brian Sullivan · Rating 3 out of 5]

It is the eightth chapter that attemts to elucidate the meaning of 'soul' and the impact of music that interested me, or perhaps some of the observarions of myth and ritual in chapter seven. The technical science in the early would be of use to only a few.

[Cliff · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a music therapist, this book pretty much justifies my existence and validates my clinical work. But, I think the philosophy also has a much larger application and is pointing the way to a new paradigm in Western thought, which focuses on the non-linear and chaotic elements in both science and day-to-day life, rather than simple linear causality. If you love music and feel that Western medicine may not be the panacea it once promised to be, you'll really dig this read.