The Negative Effects Of Music Therapy

A very sick patient is used to see many things during his or her hospital stay: machines, medications, doctors, nurses.... And, sometimes, guitars, drums, and sheet music. I read a quote that says: "Music therapy, to me, is music performance without the ego. It’s not about entertainment as much as its about empathizing. If you can use music to slip past the pain and gather insight into the workings of someone else’s mind, you can begin to fix a problem. " In this paper I will be researching and explaining what is music therapy and how is it used nowadays.
Although not very famous today, music therapy has existed long ago. Music therapy in USA began in the end of the 18th century. However, using music as a healing medium dates back to ancient

First, music is a core function in our brain. Our brain is created in a way to effectively respond to and process music. New born infants are able to detect differences in rhythmic patterns. Mothers all over the world and throughout time have used lullabies and rhythmic songs to calm crying babies. Also, music precedes language. We don’t yet know why, but our brains are wired to respond to music, even though it’s not essential for our survival. Our bodies entrain to rhythm. Entrainment is when you walk down the street, humming a song in your head and walking to the beat. Our motor systems naturally entrain, or match, to a rhythmic beat. When a musical input enters our central nervous system through the auditory nerve, most of the input goes to the brain for processing. But some of it heads straight to motor nerves in our spinal cord. This allows our muscles to move to the rhythm without our having to think about it or “try.” It’s how we dance to music, tap our foot to a rhythm, and walk in time to a beat. This is also why music therapists can help a person who’s had a stroke re-learn how to walk and develop strength and endurance in their upper bodies. We also have physiologic responses to music. Every time your breathing quickens, your heart-rate increases, or you feel a shiver down your spine, that’s your body responding physiologically to music. Qualified music therapists can use this to help stimulate a person in a coma or use music to effectively help someone relax. Music also triggers our emotions. Have you ever listened to a piece of music and smiled? Or felt sad? Whether from the music itself, or from our associations with the music, music taps into our emotional systems. Many people use this in a “therapeutic” way, listening to certain music that makes them feel a certain way. The ability for music to easily access our emotions is very