What music therapy is, and what it is not

People often arrive expecting a lesson. A music therapy session is not a lesson: nobody is being taught to play, and nothing is being marked.

What happens instead is that music becomes the way in. A therapist watches how someone responds to rhythm, to silence, to a held note, and uses that to work towards something specific — a first word, steadier hands after a stroke, a calmer morning.

You do not need to be musical. Most of the people we see are not.