Music therapy: Teachers strike an emotional chord with disabled students -- chicagotribune.com

Music therapy: Teachers strike an emotional chord with disabled students -- chicagotribune.com

"music teachers understood long before being validated by research that playing an instrument offers much more than simple pleasures and emotional release. For children and adults with disabilities, music can unleash especially powerful gifts, helping them communicate or process information in new ways"

From the Portal:

At this time of celebration for many around the world, let us remind ourselves that there are people who are struggling in life especially those with special needs. Having worked with and derived great joy from these people, I am reminded by the article above of how music can help them cope in life and how it can help us all.

I can only encourage you all, over the holiday season, to go out and see some music being performed especially in your local area. It does not have to be anything grandiose like a symphony concert although that would be nice but even just a simple local get together of people singing carols or folk songs or whatever they fancy.

Singing especially in groups is a powerful and positive experience for all people and has been for thousands of years. Don't be put off by saying "I can't sing" or "I am tone deaf", just the taking part and listening will have an effect on you and others and I am sure you will come away feeling better and more positive than before.

I aim to practice what I preach, I have been practising my violin, I have put some new strings on and intend to go out and make music this week. Enjoy music, that is why people make music, to be enjoyed, to move and to inspire.

The Portal of Healing.



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The Red Violin

Point Pleasant WV Register - Red violin comes to Wedge Auditorium stage Saturday

I was going to blog about the red violin I have just acquired and will do that next time. The Red Violin, starring Samuel L. Jackson is one of my favourite movies and not just because I am biased but because it is a compelling story. Beautifully filmed on several locations around the world, stretching over a period of some 300 years, the movie tells the story of the red violin which was made out of a tragedy. I won't spoil the movie for you but it is a haunting sound and story.

Joshua Bell, who has been featured previously on this blog, played the soundtrack and although the movie might be a little on the long side, it is never boring. I hope some of you can get along to the concert featuring Violinist Elizabeth Pitcairn, who owns the legendary 1720 Red Mendelssohn Stradivarius this weekend or to any concert sometime, for the power of music is a healing one and something which we should all try to enjoy.

The Portal of Healing.


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In Harmony

In Harmony is a community development programme aimed at using music to bring positive change to the lives of very young children in some of the most deprived areas of England, delivering benefits across the wider community.



The programme encourages participation in music – in the form of the Symphony Orchestra – which can have huge personal benefits for the children involved, providing opportunities to grow and develop, both socially and musically. In Harmony is inspired by the hugely successful Venezuelan project El Sistema and is chaired by world renowned cellist, Julian Lloyd-Webber.

(Photo Courtesy of Paul Lewis Daily Mail)

From the Portal:

In Harmony is a project that we should all encourage as much as we can. The power of music on people and the benefits it brings are clear for all to see. I personally have used music as a means of therapy when working with people with special needs and the effects are quite wonderful to see, especially with the power and subtlety that a symphony orchestra can create.

I am sure most of you can remember going to see a concert or gig somewhere for the first time and felt your body, spirit and emotions moved by the sound. This is exactly what people need in their lives, that exposure to music and the vibrational, spiritual and emotional benefit it brings.

The Portal of Healing.

Pavarotti E lucevan le stelle

There are many examples of this great singer I could choose but something brings me back to this clip of E Lucevan le stelle and the stars were shining.

The singing is great, the acting great, the lyrics are brilliant and the passion is spine tingling. It does not get better than this.

Translation:

And the stars were shining
and the earth smelled sweet
the orchard gate would creak
a footstep lightly brushed the sand
She came in fragrant as a flower
and she fell into my arms

Ah sweet kisses ah languid caresses!
Trembling, I slowly uncovered her dazzling beauty
Now my dream of love has vanished forever
My last hour has flown and I die hopeless!
I have never loved life so much!

Venezuela Youth Orchestra - Bernstein - Mambo

A wonderful sight to see so many people having fun all at once - yet again, this is a powerful example of how music and creative activity can bring people together and promote healing, wellness and sheer enjoyment - this mambo will get you dancing!

The Portal of Healing.

El Sistema - How Music Saved Venezuela's Children

The remarkable accomplishment of a great humanist, José Antonio Abreu, who dedicated his life to set up the 'Sistema' in 1975, an extraordinary music and social project, which has been running in Venezuela in an attempt to transform the lives of the nations poorest children.

El Sistema has been using classical music to tackle the social problems of a country where 60% of the population live below the poverty line. By offering free instruments and tuition through a network of after-school centres all over the country, the Sistema has kept thousands of children away from the drugs, alcohol and gang-related violence of the streets and has led to the creation of 30 professional orchestras in a country that had only 2 before it started. Currently, 275,000 children attend the El Sistema schools and many of them play in one of the 125 youth orchestras.

At the pinnacle of the system stands the Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela under its music director Gustavo Dudamel who is himself a product of the Sistema and is also the musical director for the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra.

This is an initiative we need to get going again in the UK. I was also the beneficiary of a musical education coming as I did from a poor background. I grew up in a bad neighbourhood and we always had problems with violence. My father had the good wisdom and courage to put me into music school at an early age, something for which he sacrificed and I will always be eternally grateful.

The result of that was I was always busy as a young person in a very rich, rewarding and creative environment, mixing with nice, creative people. Had I not been there, I am sure I would have to got into trouble for it was inevitable given the area we lived in.

The result of that early and intense exposure to a musical education was that I did better at school across a range of subjects, I developed social skills early on especially the confidence to communicate, I had a greater awareness of cultures from other countries and history through music and most importantly, at a time in my mid teens when I found it most difficult to cope, music was there as a release and a means of self discipline to act as a guide and a way of investing my energy in rewarding and creative pursuits.

The study of music gave me the chance to travel, something I would never have done being poor and it gave me tools later in life to study further in my adult life and acquire skills and qualifications in other subject areas purely because the discipline of playing an instrument and the mental challenge it creates was a wonderful platform for further study.

The benefits of music for everyone are plain for all to see from the video. More importantly, we must get music back on the core curriculum for everyone, not just classical but all forms of music, playing, study, music appreciation taking students to concerts. gigs and festivals is all part of what I call the rich learning experience I had as a young person.

It is so important to bring people together today and music is one of those simple things that can help to do just that. I know the In Harmony project has started in England and is based on El Sistema but it is only on a small scale. We need desperately to get music available to everyone that wants to do it. The rewards are clear to see and the money invested will reap a rich harvest of talented people.

The Portal of Healing.