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The patient's heart rate, as measured on the vital signs' monitor, was erratic and dangerously high, hovering around 183 beats per minute. The blood pressure was critically low. Panic was plainly evident in the patient's eyes, visible above the oxygen mask. Two nurses, recognizing the Music Practitioner standing in the hallway, asked her to play for the patient – a last-ditch effort to slow the patient's heartbeat before executing an invasive method, the injection of a drug directly into the heart muscle. Simple tones of the harp strings playing Pachelbel's Canon at 60 beats per minute vibrated into the room, directly at the bedside of the patient. Within 10 minutes the patient was sitting quietly in bed, eyes closed; the attending physician canceled the order for the chemical injection into the heart, saying, “This harp music is working.” After 20 minutes the Music Practitioner quietly left the room. The patient's heart rate was steady at 86 beats per minute and the blood pressure was within the normal range.
How did this happen? The sensory reception area for sound is buried deep in the primitive portion of the brain of animals, thus representing its importance to survival of all species throughout the long history of life on Earth. Sound is the first sense to develop in the womb and the last to disintegrate before death. Sound is linked to the most basic physical functions including the autonomic systems that rely on rhythm – among them brain waves, heart rate, respiratory rate and blood pressure. Without our being aware, these rhythmic systems will seek to match whatever rhythm is present. This process is called entrainment, first described hundreds of years ago in physics literature through the observation that clocks placed near one another synchronized the swinging movements of their pendulums to the exact rhythm of one another. Even though the patient described in the true-life situation above was panicked and thus, not paying attention cognitively to what was happening in the room – especially not to the unobtrusive harp sounds – the primitive brain received the rhythm of the steady 60 beats per minute sound vibrations emitted by the music. The innate regulator of the heart rate then “recognized” that beat and matched it as best it could by slowing down the heart's beating. The music was the healing agent; the Music Practitioner was the trained, compassionate presence through which the music did its work.
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Music is a particular type of organized sound, and it can be used to affect healing of the human mind/body/spirit in myriad ways. In addition to utilizing entrainment to stabilize a patient's vital signs, music played in a certain manner can assist the body into the relaxation state, which produces alpha and lower brain waves, releases endorphins (naturally-produced pain killers) and ushers in the meditative response. Music, played in another way, can help in the transition of dying patients, allowing the mind/emotions to let go of the physical world. The work of a Certified Music Practitioner (CMP) is to provide to the patient the purity of live, acoustic (non-electronically produced) music, to be received passively by the patient. CMPs do not include the patient in an interactive manner, as do Music Therapists. For example, patients do not play instruments, sing or write songs as part of the therapeutic session with a CMP. Instead, patients are invited to simply relax, close their eyes and receive the music. This allows the particular qualities of the music, as well as the compassionate presence of the practitioner, to resonate with the patient's entire energy field.
Modern day western society reveres music as entertainment. Therapeutic music is not entertainment. It is not distraction. Therapeutic music is the very old science of using music to bring about a natural balance and state of well being to the whole self through the following healing qualities:
• Vibration: Everything in the universe vibrates. With vibration comes sound. The sound an object makes is defined as the number of times per second (frequency measured in hertz) that the object is vibrating. The human hearing system can detect frequencies from 20 hertz to over 6,000 hertz, but the human physical body and bioenergy field respond to a much wider vibratory range beyond the capacity of hearing. In addition to being “heard,” the vibrations of live acoustic music impact every cell and atom as well as the energy systems of the human mind/body/spirit.
• Melody: Melody is the relationship of the tones' pitch within the music. Certain combinations are believed to be more soothing and more healing than others. For example a fifth (going from a C note to a G note) in a melody is believed to elicit balance and well being based on the geometric physics of the fifth.
• Rhythm: The number of beats per measure determines the rhythm, which affects the rhythmic systems of the physical body but also may elicit different emotional states. Music played with no set rhythm (arrhythmic) is especially effective in managing pain, producing the relaxation response and assisting dying patients in their transition.
• Speed: As in the example at the beginning of this article, speed and rhythm can work together to entrain and stabilize body functions.
• Modes, or Keys: Used extensively up through the Middle Ages in western Europe, and still very much used in eastern societies, specific modes, or keys, are the powerhouses of energetic effects of music.
These healing qualities of music were taught and used actively at the bedside for many hundreds, if not thousands, of years in the science and medicine fields. Western science broke with these traditions in the 1700s but modern medical research is once again showing us the powerful connection between human health and therapeutic music. Today, Music Therapists are well accepted members of medical teams throughout the world. Music Practitioners are a relatively new category of trained professionals, although their practice is based on thousands-of-years-old traditions.
CMPs are graduates from the national training program called the Music For Healing and Transition Program (MHTP), which held its biennial conference in Cleveland in June 2006. Training centers are located around the country, including one in Cleveland. Two years is the typical length of the training, which includes intensive internship requirements of playing for patients in order to gain experience in applying the theories learned in the classroom.
CMPs are employed in medical facilities such as hospitals, hospices, cancer centers, nursing homes, etc. Examples of instruments used by CMPs include harp, guitar, voice, clarinet, double bass and Native American flute. All of the instruments are acoustic and produce natural-sound vibrations. The benefits of live music as opposed to recorded CDs or tapes are: the trained musician brings the loving intention and presence to the bedside; the vibrations of the music; and the musician's ability to observe the patient and adjust the playing (melody, rhythm, key, speed) to adapt to the changing needs of the patient during the session.
The daughter of a dying patient welcomed the Music Practitioner outside the hospice room, telling her that her parent was in pain, restless and had not slept well for several days. The patient was asking for increased pain medicine inside of an hour of each injection, but hospice staff was not permitted to administer it more often than every four hours. Sitting close to the bedside, the Music Practitioner focused on the patient's presence and state of being, then began playing her harp in a steady, firm manner, matching the speed to the patient's rapid, labored breathing. Slowly the harpist began to soften the music and reduce the speed. The patient's respiratory rate followed the music, became slower and deeper; the eyes rested from darting around the room; the eyelids began to remain closed for periods of time. The Music Practitioner again adjusted the music to a very simple, slow, open improvisation played arrhythmically. The patient's body visibly relaxed, and then the patient slept. Soon the patient's daughter was also sleeping in her chair. Continuing for an hour and a half, the Music Practitioner joined a long line throughout history of therapeutic musicians who have lovingly been the holder of the music in vigils for the dying. Even after she left, the music remained present, vibrating and soothing the two individuals in the room. The next day the daughter told the Music Practitioner that her parent had slept through the next scheduled pain-medicine injection and for a full six hours after that, the longest time the patient had slept in weeks – a simple gift from the profound universal presence of therapeutic music.
Carol J. Spears is the site manager at James A. Garfield National Historic Site and First Ladies National Historic Site. She also is a holistic practitioner of Reiki energy healing and therapeutic harp music. Carol can be contacted at (440) 639-9958.
