Listening to Time: Is Temporality Effective in Music Therapy?

Author:

Mr. Niels Hamel

Abstract:
Music is closely related to temporality, as is the development of consciousness. Nevertheless, the entrainment of these issues within the therapeutic relationship in music therapy are hardly ever brought up or discussed in literature. Does the understanding of human consciousness and temporal processes improve the music therapeutic actions and interventions? Does the development of the client´s consci-ousness gain different structures through the experience of his/her own time structures? Is it possible to elaborate an orientation for musical actions and interventions for the music therapy practitioner ba-sed on temporality and by doing so improve the effectiveness of music therapy?
The core issue is that we music therapists are able to listen closer to the specific contents of temporality of the human psyche through music therapy. Considering the questions above, this paper presents an overview of the human experiences of time in music and their importance within the therapeutic relati-onship. Finally, it draws a line between the theory of temporality, the development of consciousness and the daily music therapy practice.
 

Biographical details:
Niels Hamel, M.D., M.A. is art therapist and music therapist. He worked in different clinical settings ranging from psychiatry to substance abuse in Brazil and the USA. Currently he is a doctoral student at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg and works with clients of the autistic spectrum at the Au-tism-Therapy-Center in Bielefeld, Germany.