{"id":44635,"date":"2025-10-07T17:13:14","date_gmt":"2025-10-07T22:13:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.und.edu\/und-today\/?p=44635"},"modified":"2025-10-08T11:02:27","modified_gmt":"2025-10-08T16:02:27","slug":"und-celebrates-power-of-music-therapy-with-just-a-little-l-o-v-e","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.und.edu\/und-today\/2025\/10\/und-celebrates-power-of-music-therapy-with-just-a-little-l-o-v-e\/","title":{"rendered":"UND celebrates power of music therapy with just a little \u2018L-O-V-E\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Stories from neuroscientist Daniel Levitin \u2014 plus a little singalong \u2014 turn possible skeptics into believers<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Renowned
Renowned neuroscientist, bestselling author and musician Daniel Levitin talks about the incredible advances in music therapy in a recent lecture in the Josephine Campbell Recital Hall in UND\u2019s Hughes Fine Arts Center. Photo by Janelle Vonasek\/UND Today.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Music therapy \u2014 the brain science and the educational training \u2014 was still a mystery to at least some of the 100-plus people gathered recently inside the Josephine Campbell Recital Hall in UND\u2019s Hughes Fine Arts Center.<\/p>\n

They had come to learn more about what Music Therapy Program Director Carly Flaagan<\/strong><\/a> described on stage as an \u201cevidence-based practice of using music as the agent of change to promote health care outcomes across the spectrum of life within an established therapeutic relationship.\u201d<\/p>\n

Right off the bat, Flaagan acknowledged that the very definition of music therapy can sound like a mouthful and seem a bit confusing. But on this evening, participants also would get to hear from one of the world\u2019s leading experts on the subject.<\/p>\n

Renowned neuroscientist and researcher, repeat bestselling author and accomplished musician Daniel Levitin<\/strong><\/a> had come to campus to talk to students and the Greater Grand Forks community while helping the College of Arts & Sciences<\/strong><\/a> celebrate the return of its Music Therapy<\/strong><\/a> bachelor\u2019s degree after a 10-year pause.<\/p>\n

\"UND
UND Music Therapy Director Carly Flaagan (on guitar) and the first cohort of the new Music Therapy bachelor\u2019s degree class lead an experiential exercise in music therapy. Photo by Janelle Vonasek\/UND Today.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Spreading the word and better understanding<\/h2>\n

\u201cIf that definition sounds broad and abstract, it\u2019s because that\u2019s on purpose,\u201d an enthusiastic Flaagan explained during her introductory remarks. \u201cMusic therapy is difficult to describe in a nutshell because it\u2019s so expansive in its approaches to practice and in where professional music therapists can work and in the kinds of people they can serve.\u201d<\/p>\n

For instance, she told the crowd, you\u2019ll find music therapists in hospitals and on hospice teams, in nursing homes and memory care facilities, as well as in schools, psychiatric units and in private practices.<\/p>\n

\u201cMusic therapy can have impacts both big and small on people\u2019s lives. It can help people of all ages and in many populations,\u201d Flaagan said. \u201cIt can help a baby and its parents bond in the NICU. It can help an Alzheimer\u2019s patient be present and connect to their core self through musical memory and engagement.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt can help an autistic individual develop strategies for joint attention, and it can support young children in developing early language and communication skills. The list goes on and on. Music therapy even can be there as a person takes their last few breaths \u2014 bringing down their heart rate to make those moments more peaceful.\u201d<\/p>\n

Because music is such an intrinsic part of the human experience, Flaagan said most people have little trouble understanding how music therapy can influence mood. However, understanding its tremendous power to transcend emotional health to help people overcome physical or cognitive challenges can be significantly harder to grasp.<\/p>\n

\"Dean
Brad Rundquist (front, left), dean of the UND College of Arts & Sciences, shakes his musical instrument on cue along with 100-plus other guests during a music therapy experiential exercise. Photo by Janelle Vonasek\/UND Today.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

So, exactly how does music therapy work?<\/h2>\n

Flaagan would begin to answer that question by inviting the audience to take part in an experiential exercise demonstrating how selective attention can be used to prompt a desired response that becomes almost automatic.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone in the first few rows, check under your seats,\u201d Flaagan instructed the guests. With puzzled looks on their faces, people immediately ducked down to pull out dozens of colorful percussive instruments. The people seated farther back would be able to participate, too. They\u2019d clap their hands to provide another brand of percussion.<\/p>\n

After Flaagan roughly divided the auditorium into four sections, she assigned each group a letter cue based on the \u201cL-O-V-E\u201d song lyrics made famous by jazz pianist and crooner Nat King Cole.<\/p>\n

The directions that came next were simple: Every time you hear your letter, strike a single beat. With that, Flaagan picked up her guitar and began to strum and sing:<\/p>\n

L<\/em><\/strong> is for the way you look at me \u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

O<\/em><\/strong> is for the only one I see \u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

V<\/em><\/strong> is very, very extraordinary \u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

E<\/em><\/strong> is even more than anyone that you adore <\/em>\u2026<\/p>\n

In a heartbeat, the entire hall was transformed into a giant ensemble \u2014 listening, waiting, restraining and striking at just the right moment. Even as Flaagan quickened the pace with each line and verse, she could not throw the focused musicians off the beat.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love that you all did that with me,\u201d a breathless Flaagan said over the last chord. \u201cThat is selective attention \u2014 ignoring what doesn\u2019t matter so you can do the right thing at the right time. Tonight, you didn\u2019t just hear about music therapy \u2014 you did<\/em><\/strong> it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Heads began to nod in unison. It was beginning to make sense.<\/p>\n

And it made even more sense as Flaagan explained how music therapists can use a similar technique to help stroke victims retrain their brains to recover \u201clost\u201d motions such as how to use a fork to feed themselves.<\/p>\n

The exercise may have sparked the evening\u2019s first aha moment, but there would be many more as Levitin took the stage.<\/p>\n

\"Dr.
Neuroscientist Daniel Levitin signs one of his many books on the subject for a guest who attended his lecture on the merits of music therapy. UND Music Therapy Director Carly Flaagan smiles in the background. Photo by Janelle Vonasek\/UND Today.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The proof is in the science and the brain<\/h2>\n

First, a little background: Levitin completed his postdoctoral training in neuroimaging at Stanford University Medical School and training in cognitive psychology at the University of California-Berkeley after earning his bachelor\u2019s from Stanford and his doctorate in psychology from the University of Oregon.<\/p>\n

His research spans music, the brain, health, productivity and creativity, and he has published more than 300 articles in prestigious journals such as Science, Nature and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. His work has been featured in popular press, including The New York Times, as well as Scientific American and Rolling Stone magazines, and his TED talk is said to be one of the most viewed of all time.<\/p>\n

Levitin also is the author of several New York Times bestsellers, including \u201cThis Is Your Brain on Music,\u201d \u201cThe World in Six Songs,\u201d \u201cThe Organized Mind,\u201d \u201cSuccessful Aging\u201d and the latest, \u201cI Heard There Was a Secret Chord: Music as Medicine.\u201d<\/p>\n

Levitin has consulted for companies the likes of Apple, Microsoft and Sony, and he\u2019s also spoken at institutions ranging from Congress to Google and Amazon. As a musician, he has performed with legends such as Mel Torme, Sting and Rosanne Cash, and he has contributed to albums and films, including \u201cGood Will Hunting\u201d and \u201cPulp Fiction.\u201d<\/p>\n

The neuroscientist opened his UND talk by reminding the audience that while music itself is ancient \u2014 humans have buried musical instruments with their dead as far back as 4,600 years \u2014 the scientific study of music\u2019s medical effects is relatively new.<\/p>\n

People long have seen the value in music, Levitin said, but it wouldn\u2019t be until the advent of modern brain imaging and neurochemistry in the early 2000s that researchers actually could \u201csee\u201d <\/em>how music activates pleasure circuits, lowers stress markers and influences immune function. And it was that evidence that finally persuaded the National Institutes of Health to take music seriously.<\/p>\n

The NIH in 2013 issued a call for proposals, and a few years later it began to award tens of millions of dollars in research grants. Fast-forward to today, and virtually all 21 NIH institutes \u2014 from cancer to aging to addiction \u2014 are investing in music-as-medicine research, he said.<\/p>\n

Levitin\u2019s point was clear: what our ancestors intuited thousands of years ago now is being confirmed with science. And that momentum is only growing.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy lab was one of the first labs to study the musical brain, and it was the objective nature of brain scans actually showing where music affects the brain, where the blood goes and the measurement of neurochemistry, that allowed us to make advances,\u201d Levitin said. \u201cAnd now it\u2019s commonplace in journals across all different biomedical and scientific fields to have something about music.\u201d<\/p>\n

Levitin went on to say that he and physician-geneticist Francis Collins \u2014 best known for his leadership of the Human Genome Project \u2014 are working to get a bill introduced that would make Medicare pay for forms of music therapy that currently are not covered.<\/p>\n

\"The
Over and over, the audience was wowed by what they saw and heard at the recent \u201cMusic & Health\u201d presentation by Daniel Levitin, a neuroscientist who has written multiple New York Times bestsellers on the topic of music and the brain. Photo by Janelle Vonasek\/UND Today.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For the doubters, seeing is believing<\/h2>\n

The bottom line, Levitin said, is that \u201cmusic therapy is evidence-based, not pseudoscientific.\u201d<\/p>\n

For the sake of example, he talked about how \u2026<\/p>\n