| Contents |
September 1959-June 1960: Sunfield Children's Home -- The inception of the work -- June-November 1960: European tour -- The widening exploration -- February-July 1961: The Devereux schools, and the day-care unit for autistic children, Department of Child Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania -- Outline of a new music therapy -- September 1961-March 1962: Institute of Logopedics -- Individual music therapy: Categories of response -- Experimental group activity: Working reports -- Pif-paf-poltrie, the working game as therapy -- May 1962-May 1967: Day-care unit for autistic children, Department of Child Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania -- Music therapy and personality change in autistic children -- November 1962-February 1967: School district of Philadelphia -- Group musical activities with trainable children -- A rationale of group music therapy -- Epilogue: To the musician therapist -- Appendix I. Individual music therapy ; Appendix II. Group musical activities. |
| Abstract |
Music therapy is one of the most recent developments in the treatment of handicapped children, and its use is increasing steadily year by year. More and more young people are becoming interested and many professional musicians also. It is used extensively in hospitals and institutions throughout the country but very few books have been published on the subject. There is no 'conventional' music therapy as such. The music therapist works individually, as an artist, and needs, in his handbook, both inspirational and directional help. And it is just this sort of help that Dr. Nordoff and Mr. Robbins set out to give. Their book consists of vivid descriptions of their work, the way they go about it, and the reactions of the children at whom it is directed. In this book they concentrate on work with the most challenging: autistic children, mongols, aphasoids, children with brain-damage, and children who are physically as well as mentally crippled. Many of these children who are physically as well as mentally crippled. Many of these children have never been able to communicate by normal means, and are totally unreceptive. It is most exciting and moving to read how the music therapist has found a way of arousing a first basic, if tentative, response in such a child; and how he has been able to build on this until the child can respond to stimuli other than music. Dr. Nordoff and Mr. Robbins, who are themselves closely connected with the training of students, describe their work, both in individual and in group therapy, and with children of all levels from the completely autistic to the trainable. The book has been highly praised by experts in the care of backward children on both sides of the Atlantic, and has already been translated for publication in Germany. Miss Sybil Beresford-Peirse, a music therapist working in London, writes: 'The value of the Nordoff/Robbins approach is in their deep insight into the needs of individual children based on years of experience and clinical observation. Their work is permeated by a very high artistic sensitivity, skill and imagination which can point the way for others. The appearance of this book is both timely and opportune.' Paul Nordoff is an American composer who, in the past, combined university teaching with composition for concert hall and theatre. He was so impressed by the scope of music therapy that he gave up his career when he decided that music therapy was the only worthwhile work for a twentieth-century musician. Clive Robbins took a position at Sunfield Children's Homes in Worcestershire as a special educator. He and Dr. Nordoff met there, and have worked together as a team for many years, first at Sunfield, later at Pennsylvania University and with backward children in Philadelphia. |
