Sloboda (1989) points out that language and music are: The underlying premise of this paper is that speech is both a cognitive and musical process and that humans are engaged in this process at every juncture of engagement in moment-to-moment communication. Subsequently, the tones and timbres we select influence the ideas we seek to communicate and gravely influence our listeners, providing revelations about our emotions and our truest intentions, thru the way we express our words. Our constant quest to locate the precise word to describe a particular idea occurs at virtually every moment in which we are engaging in discourse. The thoughts we have require an inner search for a contextual description. It is useful to note these similarities as we ponder the notion that speech is part content and part expression in its basis. In the text The Musical Mind, psychologist John Sloboda (1989) identifies seven striking links between language and music. When we speak words, we are consciously and often unconsciously selecting dynamic, rhythmic and timbric elements to express our wishes, thoughts and responses to others in a way that is uniquely indicative of who we are. Anderson (1982) would add cognition, association and autonomous skills to this acquisition process. This history includes our capacity to listen (receptive), our ability to express (expressive) and the environment in which we have grown accustomed to the use of our voice through words in discourse (culture). With words, we combine in a selective way morphemes deliberate pieces of content that we string together with adherence to the history of our use. The most personal and uniquely musical presentation in every day human expression is speech.

The following article provides history, rationale, definition of practice and theory that provides strong backing for the integration of the models and approaches currently available to music therapists. This includes our brain and neurological functioning, our emotions and ego state, our intellectual and historic use of cognitive processes and the cultural realm of our existence.Īlthough there has been a fair amount of research and clinical practice related to neurological music therapy, speech production within a musical context and music psychotherapeutic voice work, we rarely find these practices intertwined. The words we choose and the musical qualities that we use to express our words are based on a broad spectrum of functioning. The use of spoken language is one of the most uniquely human parameters that differentiate one human being from another.

The audio excerpts are republished here with the kind permission from the American Music Therapy Association, Inc., 8455 Colesville Road, Suite 1000, Silver Spring, Maryland 20910, USA. Silver Spring: American Music Therapy Association. Retrieved from Music Therapy Research, CD-ROM I, 1964-1998. Musical stages of speech, Audio excerpts #1, #4, #6, and #7 Music Therapy, vol 13(1). [Editorial note: Audio excerpts (a), (b), (d), and (e) has been previously published in: Loewy, Joanne (1995). Integrating Music, Language and the Voice in Music Therapy

Musicality and music before three