What is it about music in particular? Because I often think about the joy that people get from doing music together. But perhaps it's not that simple. >> It is that simple. But it's also that you can give nice, complicated explanations for this as well. So, from my background, always come back to, sort of, my slogan would be follow the phenomenology, all right? Sounds very complicated, but what do I mean by that? I mean that, if we look at what is music as a phenomenon, how is it different from sport, how is it different from painting a picture together, how is it different from doing drama? So, how is it appear to us as something which has certain features, certain things it enables, certain things it can't do? So, what is music in those sense? So, in this context of talking about music and community, music and, what is musical togetherness? We could start off with that question. >> Right. >> So, when people do things musically, you can do it at the same time, someone can sing a note, someone can play another note on the guitar, someone can play a chord on the piano, someone halfway back of the cafe can play a little shaker. All of that can go together in a way that is meaningful and doesn't obscure the people you can hear through musical texture. So, everyone potentially can add to it and make something of a musical hole right there and then. But also not lose themselves in it. So, that is what music does in order to make togetherness. It's something that music can naturally do because it's phenomenology. >> So, the role that you're talking about as a music therapist might be to provide a musical structure for that that doesn't drive in any direction. I know I've seen you sit on a piano, perhaps, and just hold some chords. Or I might use a drum just to offer a beat underneath something. But I've also seen other kinds of musicians who might be more directive in a similar situation, and get everybody to join in. What's the difference between those two approaches? >> I don't think they're two approaches. I think it's when certain things are relevant. >> Great. >> So, it's when you do what? I think the craft skill of music therapy is a matter of timing. Not exactly what you do. You can do all kinds of different things at different times, but it's your intuition which is based on your experience and your training, of when to do what. Which is true of most specialist skills, isn't it? When do you intervene? When do you say to people, okay, let's try and get this more together? When do you just let it happen? When do you see things getting out of control and just pushing, pulling slightly back? When do you think what we really now is to just let things go? So it's that. And that was going, back to Nordiff-Robbins again, yes, it's interventionist, but in the time and space that intervention is needed. >> Yeah. >> So, intervention means actually going into the way of something happening, then you come into it. And you might sometimes lead, sometimes follow. And then, you come back, certainly. So, I'll give you an example of that in a moment. I'm working in you'd call aged care at the moment, so in a nursing home. >> Yes. >> So, in order to get people's attention to allow the music to be present for them, the music has to have a presence, because people's, cognitively, are very challenged. So, in a sense, the world is quite diffuse and it needs to be something quite strong to attract attention and concentration. So, there, I might well start off by quite strongly bringing a known song in that they can identify with. You gradually see listening orientate towards the music, or me as the music provider at that point. People say, but then the important thing is when you see someone, a lady just beginning to sing that song, is then I come right back, in order that she then leads it, yeah? And as she falters, I come back in again. >> Yeah. >> As she gains strength, come back out again. So, it's again, that's micro-timing. That's when are you playing more? When are you playing less? >> Yeah. >> So, listening is the key. >> [CROSSTALK] And I can hear that not playing. Because in enhancing a community to feel more connected, it's not about you. It's actually about your ability to listen to the different people who may be singing a song that they know, or perhaps they're just playing an instrument. >> But your willingness to listen to how and when they do that is how the community itself benefits, not through the perfect performance of a pace that makes them look good necessarily. >> That's right. >> That must be very beautiful, too, for people to experience the sense of being heard amongst others, and still having somebody listening to their individual contribution and coming up underneath, and then backing away as they need. >> I think that's exactly it. So, in a group context, or if you even go and widen that, when you might have, I don't know, 20, 30, 40 people. >> Yeah. >> The skill and the intention is how can you balance attention on individual people and their individual needs? But also the whole, and the relationship between individuals and the whole. So, my slogan for this kind of work is follow where people and music lead. You don't know what is needed, you don't know what will be the best for any given situation. You can come in with materials, resources, ideas, suggestions. But, no, the nature of a complex situation between people is that things will emerge. So, in a sense, you're listening musically, that's what we do because that's what we're experts in. But if you listen musically, you listen to the hints, the signs of what can be happening.
