Sing but Can’t Talk

Hey everyone,

Well let me see my old neighbor, who now lives in the east, came over on her honeymoon to visit her old roots, and to visit old friends like my family. Any way we got to talking and we find out she is a music therapist. This profession is becoming more popular and is also quite interesting. She states that music therapy is a way an individual can obtain goals, through music. According to her, music affects a different part of the brain, and this allows people to reach goals even though it may seem impossible. To give you an idea by what I mean by impossible think about these two examples she gave us. The first one was a person who had suffered a stroke and could not speak because of it. Using music therapy the person is able to sing to music because, as mentioned before, music effects another part of the brain instead of the speak part. I was totally shocked at this. I mean it really is a hard thing to get your head around, you would think if someone has the inability to talk how on earth can they sing? But, I guess the body does work in mysterious ways. Another example that she mentioned is that a person after a car crash can dance but is unable to walk. This is extremely hard to understand, but according to her music aids people to do these remarkable (or you would other wise think impossible) things. I found it interesting at least :)

Kristen Kerr