MUSIC THERAPY

[raymond_vacchino]

While growing up with Tourette Syndrome and having to live with the distraction of its hidious tics, I felt that my life would be one filled with despair. The teasing and bullying by classmates and the obvious frustration conveyed by my teacher's only made things worse. I would ask myself time and time again, what could I do to make this living in desparation stop! When I was five years old I began taking piano lessons, and my love of music and the overwhelming joy it consumed me with, was immediate! I had finally found something that I could relate to, and invest my total ability of concentration. As I aquired greater technical facility and \"perfect-pitch\", my ability to concentrate on improving and polishing my playing grew emensely. By the age of ten, I could sit down at the piano and practice for 4-6 hours. The time passed so quickly and almost unknowingly. I had trained my brain to focus itself totally on the task at hand, hours of repetition of musical passages, to the point of perfection! It was then that I realized when practicing and playing for long periods of time, my \"tics\" virtually vanished, it was as if having TS didn\'t exist! For some unknown reason, my brain needed to shift its obsession on my TS tics, to the overwhelming demands I was creating as a result of \"making music\", something I loved, something that felt totally natural, and expressed the inner being of my soul. I had finally found a way to be free of my despair, even if it was only when I was making \"music\", a God given gift, a gift that would become the \"best\" medicine I could ever have. The doctors were astonished by my spontaneous remission, but responded to my account of using sound to \"heal\" with the comment, \"We know so little of this kind of medical miracle.\"

As a result, I not only went on to become a concert-pianist, I became a Music Therapist so I could use my wealth of knowledge and theraputic techniques to continually control my TS tics. As a teacher, I use music therapy techniques with my student\'s, and find that they improve their sense of well being, and builds greater confidence in them when preparing for auditions, competitions and concerts. I have 6 student\'s that are afflicted by Tourette Syndrome, and observing how their own music making has changed their lives in a positively, remarkable way, touches my heart each and everyday!

Although you may not have as dramatic an experience as mine, you too can benefit from the life-giving powers of sound and music.

In my future articles on music as therapy, I will discuss how it has enhanced the lives of individuals and families, as a result of these explorations. You will learn how music heals and how to integrate this powerful transformational medium into your daily lives. You are already more musically inclined than you think. Everyone is! The world is inherently musical. Cutting across all ages, religions, and nationalities, music is a language with universal components!

"Music is your own experience, your thoughts, your wisdom. If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn"

--Charlie Parker

Musically, yours, Raymond Vacchino M.Mus. (MT) M.Mus. (Per.) AMTA(professional/status)