Professors from 3 countries talk about future of music therapy

Bawaba News celebrates music therapy professors, coinciding with the World Music Therapy Day, which the World Federation of Music Therapy (WFMT) first launched in 2016 to be observed on March 1 of each year. The World Music Therapy Day sheds light on music therapists all over the world and shows how music provides a way to make life better and more fulfilling. Many people refer to music as a universal language, as the treatment is rooted in history and many civilizations have utilized it and believed in its healing effect on humans.

Dr. Rihab Jebali, president and founder of the Tunisian Association of Music Therapy, said that music therapy is “a form of therapy that uses all types and components of music to improve the mental, physical, psychological and spiritual health of the individual.” (Jebali, 2020). This field has received the attention of psychiatrists and clinical psychologists in Tunisia since 1970.

Jebali also established the first experience of music therapy in the Department of Oncology for Cancer in a clinic specializing in this field in Tunisia and presented a new method of music therapy with people coming for chemotherapy, which was based on relaxation techniques, sound and guided imagery. (Jebali, 2012). Then, in 2014, Jebali and Dr. Ashraf Kamoun established the Tunisian Association for Music Therapy to enhance its techniques, such as alternative medicine and complementary therapy, to develop research and frame researchers in this field, work to promote music therapy in Tunisia at home and abroad, and provide music therapy for those with special needs. The Tunisian Association for Music Therapy has many conferences, seminars, training courses and practical workshops in music therapy for people with special needs, in cooperation with national and international institutions and through the exchange of experiences of those with different specialties, such as psychiatry, psychology, music sciences and arts.

The Tunisian Association for Music Therapy has contributed to consolidating the basic principles of music therapy in Tunisia through training and university supervision of researchers in this field.

In January 2020, the Tunisian Association of Music Therapy signed a partnership agreement with the Ministry of Health to integrate music therapy into all public and private care services and hospitals in the country.

In March 2020, the first music therapy and curative services center in Tunisia, the Harmony Center for Music Therapy and Curative Services, was established.

Jebali said that they are currently teaching music therapy as a specialty after researching the first professional master’s at the Faculty of Medicine and the Higher Institute of Music in Sousse, which was previously only a unit studied at the Higher Institute for Specialized Education directed to students, specialized educators, and students who wish to obtain a professional master’s degree in disability and rehabilitation or a master's degree in specialized education.

In recent years, with the increase in psychological pressures, the Arab world has become aware and believing in the value of music therapy as an alternative treatment. Jebali hopes that the field of music therapy will develop more and more in the Arab world.

Dr. Hamda Farhat, president of the Lebanese Association for Music Therapy, said, “Our goal for the human being, wherever we are, is to improve the quality of life for all ages through music, this blessing gifted to us, and to develop treatments and strive to cure the illnesses and psychological, physical and relational disorders, rehabilitate those in need, and solve learning problems.

“I started working as a music therapist as a mediator in my private clinic in the village of Beit Shama in 2006 during training, which was under the supervision of Professor Dr. Yves Morhain at Université Lumiere Lyon 2 and Professor Dr. Christine Nassar in Lebanon, entitled La Musique Comme Médiation Thérapeutique dans le Traitement de la Dépression Music as a therapeutic mediator for depression,” she added.

Farhat is a professor at Lebanese University’s Faculties of Arts and Health in the Departments of Psychology, Speech Therapy and Nutrition, and she is a master’s supervisor and also a certified coordinator and training supervisor for psychology students seeking permission to practice the profession from the Ministry of Health. She holds a doctorate in clinical and patient psychology, a degree in psychiatric diagnosis from Harvard Medical School and the World Health Organization (WHO), a BA in Music Education, and a study in the Lebanese National Conservatory. She also has artistic musical experience as a member in the musical troupe of composer Professor Salim Fleifel and Dr. Salim Saad, as well as the establishment of a special band composed of university and high school students and professional musicians, which participates in many official activities such as Environment Day, Red Cross Day, Liberation Day, Independence Day and graduation celebrations at Lebanese University. Some members of the band even performed with Sami Clark on his Pele Mele TV program.

Farhat has also worked with music therapy as a kind of revolutionary psychological therapy in multiple fields and centers, including rehabilitation, hospitalization, and training for therapists, doctors and educators, locally and with well-known international organizations. All of this has been documented in digital encyclopedias, in addition to seminars and media interviews.

She has developed and innovated many techniques. Her triple method of music therapy and was applied to many samples and with other researchers as part of their university theses.

In 2017, the first training center in Lebanon was established at the Tayouneh Medical Center in Mount Lebanon Governorate, where Farhat trained many psychotherapists studying music and students in masters and professional prep programs, and they joined the World Federation of Music Therapy.

In 2019, Farhat founded an association for specialists in the fields of clinical psychology, education and music to train those seeking a specialty in music therapy, along with Dr. Eliya Francis, a musician and brother of the famous artist Wadih El Safi, and Dr. Antoine Al-Chartouni, a professor, author and musician.

Dr. Ghada Abdelrahim, president of the Egyptian Society of Music Therapy, professor of music psychology at Cairo University, and member of the British Association of Music Therapy (BAMT), said that she played the violin and piano from a young age, and then her talent was enriched by studying music at Cairo University’s Faculty of Special Education. Because she loved to be different, she rebelled after graduation from working as a music teacher and instead opened new horizons for herself in other fields.

Influenced by Beethoven, Mozart and others, Ghada realized the true meaning of music and its role in reforming societies, and she was able to invent new methods of art therapy through music.

“I read about the role of music in influencing the human soul, and I was surprised that it has had an effect on humans since the beginning of creation. Primitive man was influenced by the sounds of nature, and the ancient Egyptians possessed sophisticated art, which was evident in their murals depicting harps and drums. When kings became sick, musicians were brought to them, because they believed that music expels evil from the body,” Ghada said.

“With the passage of time, especially in the Middle Ages and then in the Islamic era, the Arabs used to play the oud to expel negative energy and sadness. Then zar exorcism gatherings appeared, and after World War II, street performers visited hospitals to relieve the calamities of war. It is from here that the idea of ​​music therapy began, and an association was created for this purpose,” she added.

Ghada believes there is a firm relationship between psychology and music, as music psychology is derived from music therapy. She continued, “I discovered that there are 400 universities around the world that include this specialization, including Oxford, Cambridge and Harvard, where music therapy is used for animals, plants and humans, and the latter type is used in schools, homes for the elderly, orphanages and charitable institutions.”

Ghada contributed to treating depression, blood pressure, Alzheimer's and cancer patients, as well as treating hyperactivity, reading and learning difficulties, and autism. She has also succeeded in saving groups of refugee and street children, and studies have shown that music cured Alzheimer's patients and refugee children.

Ghada explained, “We started with Dr. Nabila Mikhail, a professor of music education, who challenged her husband, an internal medicine doctor, in treating patients with music. She prepared a study on that and succeeded in proving her point of view. As for Professor Amal Sadiq, she prepared translations to measure the ability of music to the creativity of the child, and she also proved that, but all of these efforts did not fall under a specific name in Egypt at that time.”

“After I graduated, I refused to work as a teaching assistant and got a master’s in education. Due to my insistence on specialization, a list of new specializations was issued, including Psychology of Music Education, and I was the first researcher to obtain a doctorate in this field. My dream came true,” she added.

Over time, Ghada corresponded with professors from Harvard to deepen this study in Egypt, and she founded the Arab Association for Music Therapy, in which many participated from Egypt, Palestine, Lebanon, Tunisia and some Gulf countries such as Kuwait, with the aim of persuading people to treat through music.

Regarding her future projects, Ghada said, “I am thinking of communicating with the National Council for Motherhood and Childhood and UNICEF to use music to treat bullying and to provide psychological support with music to discipline behavior.”

Ghada is also working on launching the first website that talks about this science to convince people of the importance of music in treating various diseases and improving behavior, and she dreams of establishing a supplementary academy for this science.