Episode 07: The Psychology of Music Elements (with Michael Zanders, Phd, MT-BC, LPC)
Join us for an insightful podcast episode featuring Dr. Michael Zanders, where we delve into the fascinating realm of music psychotherapy and specifically, the psychology of music elements. We'll explore the psychological significance of various musical elements (meter, tempo, melody, harmony), how they can be interpreted in the context of music psychotherapy, and how they can mirror different aspects of our psyche including our emotions and life experiences. This episode is a must-listen for anyone interested in exploring the intersection of music and mental health.
About Dr Z.
Dr. Michael Zanders’ research foci includes a variety of topics related to advanced clinical theory, practice and reflexive research in music therapy. His recent research has focused on music therapy treatment practices in working with youth in the child welfare system, particularly foster care youth. Dr. Zanders has presented extensively regionally, nationally and internationally at conferences and workshops, and has published both within the music therapy and counseling/psychotherapy fields. Prior to coming to Temple University, Zanders served as the program coordinator at Texas Woman’s University (TWU). In this role, was he awarded the Innovation in Academia Award for distinguished and innovative leadership. He has developed comprehensive education and clinical training programs that emphasize foundational understanding of competencies and dispositions for music therapy students.
Episode Resources:
Article - Music as Therapy Versus Music in Therapy
Transcript
This transcript was computer generated and might contain errors.
Marisa: Hey everyone! Thanks for tuning into another episode of musical Mindspace. And thanks to everyone who listened to our last episode about music and imagery with Dr Nicki Cohen. It’s been really exciting to collaborate with music therapists all over the country really for these episodes. I’ve personally really enjoyed hearing from our guests and learning more about different aspects of music.
It’s been a couple months since we’ve released a new episode but in the meantime, I’ve been planning and recruiting guests and I have to say, we’ve got a pretty cool line up to look forward to for this year.
Today’s episode is going to focus a topic that we’ve gotten requests about - the psychology of music elements. Similar to our last topic, this episode will dive into the world of music psychotherapy, but from a different angle.
Have you ever listened to a song and really resonated with a music element in that song? For example, maybe the driving pulse of the drum track or the melody of a guitar solo. For our musicians out there, have you ever composed a piece of music and felt drawn to a particular chord or progression? For the music therapists listening, have you ever done an improvisation where a client wanted repeat a particular note?
The elements of music are subconscious representations of our psyche. That’s what this episode is all about and I’ve recruited an awesome guest to help us unpack it all - Dr Michael Zanders. Dr Z is a board certified music therapist and professor at Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. I was fortunate enough to study from Dr Z as early as my first music therapy class. I had just moved to Texas Woman’s University in Denton, Texas and he was teaching intro to music therapy that semester. That was my first semester there. He also served as the program coordinator there at TWU and just knowing other students in Texas, it’s safe to say that he really made an impact there.
After I did my Master’s in health science I kinda knew that I wanted to return to studying music therapy again. After looking into different programs, I decided to apply at Temple and now I’m grateful that I’m able to continue learning from him.
Dr Z has done lots of important research for our field, with a focus on music therapy with foster care youth. He’s presented and conducted research internationally and, aside from being a music therapist, he is also a licensed professional counselor. His perspective on music and his experience working in mental health settings is going to really interesting to hear for this topic. I’m looking forward to hearing what he has to share with us and diving deep into the psychology of music elements.
So, this is what’s in our mind space today. This is episode 7, the psychology of music elements...
Marisa: Hi Dr. Z. Thank you for being here today.
Michael Zanders: Hey Marisa, how are you?
Marisa: Good. I'm super excited for this episode actually. I've been looking forward to this one.
Michael Zanders: Yes, I am too. I'm always happy to talk with you. Especially about this stuff.
Marisa: Oh yeah, these are the best conversations. It alright.
Michael Zanders: Yeah, yeah, we can make up stuff and about whatever we want to say. We'll think it's true. So I've always good with that.
Marisa: *laughs* Yeah for why don't you start with something that is true. Why don't you tell us about yourself and some of your clinical background?
Michael Zanders: Well, I've worked a long time, but I'm not old yet. No I’m kidding, I am old. I've been a music therapist for many years board certified. And then, you know, I also do have a counseling/ psychology background to with that. So, yeah, I've worked in a variety of places/environment/settings types of styles and different orientations. And now I'm a professor at Temple University in Philadelphia for those who do not know where Temple is listening to this podcast.
Marisa: So for everybody in the valley not Temple, Texas.
Michael Zanders: Right, and yeah, but stayed in Texas, I'm fond of Texas. I lived there for six years as you know Marisa and taught at Texas Woman's University and absolutely it, loved the students…most of them were great. There are few like you that were problematic, but nah it was great.
Marisa: Just a little bit *laughs*
Michael Zanders: Just a little bit. Yeah and it's an honor to keep connected. If anything about being a therapist is that you don't keep in touch with clients and there's so many heartwarming and heartbreaking stories and you can't ethically to keep involved their lives but students and now colleagues. it's really valuable and I think there's anything in life is that as much as trying to help others is staying connected and keeps me on my toes
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: but just Yeah.
Marisa: Yeah, it's something that you said to me a few times that it’s just like the people, the connections that you make along the way and so it's really great to still be connected to you and all the people really that I've gone through different programs with both at Texas Women’s while we were there and then now at Temple. It's been really great experience so far…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: And you studied at Temple which is where you are now, right?
Michael Zanders: Yes. Yeah, I mean, people will say it's not a good idea to do all your degrees at one University to get different perspectives, but what I did…I did my undergraduate degree at Temple, but I didn't come to Temple to become a music therapist. I came to be a translator so um…
Marisa: That's right. Yeah.
Michael Zanders: Yeah, but I was gigging a lot. I was musician. So I played with a lot of people in the city and decided to switch and got my undergraduate degree. Well when I was first working as a music therapist, if you took practicum and fieldwork students and internship students like you do, Temple would give you credits/tuition remission for the amount of students you would take so I started going part-time with classes like I would take one class a semester, Master’s classes, because they were essentially free and at some point, you know, I went full time and I got a teaching assistantship as a Master's so there was no other place to go because I was already kind of…I had classes or because they had given me credit/tuition remission and then at the time when I finished my Master's, Temple had the first PhD program purely in music therapy. All the other programs in the United States in music therapy, you get a PhD but it’s not necessarily in music therapy. And I'm not devaluing these programs, but it's not a pure music therapy PhD. So at that point wanting a PhD there was no other place to go at that time I went to Temple for that.
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: And I did get…I think that beauty of Temple, and what it was like when we were in Texas, is the inclusiveness of thought. We weren't limited to thought and so maybe I didn't get different perspectives in my education, but I did during my training and education outside of Temple. I guess we'll talk about I've had outside training education in different therapeutic orientations and approaches so you know, yeah.
Marisa: Yeah. No, that makes sense to me because I think that's what has struck me the most about being a student there is that everybody, even is from different cultures, different countries. And so it's kind of like a global perspective, I feel like. Because everybody's from different parts of the world, the professors and the students too. We've had people log in from everywhere and so it's been really cool to see that and that's actually definitely been something that I've really appreciated in the program as well.
Michael Zanders: cool. right
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: Yeah. What led you then after doing all of that and staying at Temple and then starting to work as a music therapist, how did you find music psychotherapy? I know it's a big part of the temple program but for those that don't know…what is music psychotherapy? And how did you kind of start working and relating to it?
Michael Zanders: So even in undergraduate training, there's a heavy emphasis in supervision on what you would say psychotherapy and counseling. Now psychotherapy, and this outside of music, is any kind of work it's deep work with a client using approaches that deal with emotional or the mind, not medical or physical things. Now there could be by products to that so any orientation that if people know psychology, from behavioral, humanism, existentialism, psychodynamic, multisystemic…they all can be psychotherapy. it's harder to define…
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: but counseling is a little different. It's usually short-term and it's the same concept. Some people use the same approaches. For example, humanistic is a counseling approach but it's also psychotherapy approach, in people that were all humans, we all have potential and unconditional positive regard but music psychotherapy is using those approaches but from a musical foundation, so if you can think of levels of psychotherapy with music, you can say music psychotherapy it's only musical methods …you know, the four main methods, receptive, re-creative. It's using those methods purely or for example, in improvisation, music psychotherapy would be purely doing music and no verbal discussion. And all the growth, change, however, you want to find it occurs in the music and within the music. Now you can go different levels.
Marisa: yeah.
Michael Zanders: There's music psychotherapy with verbal where, like we do a lot of classes, where you do a song and then you talk about it and then you get into concerns and going back to orientations. You can go from really surface level or you can go to reconstructive levels where the psyche is deeply reconstructed and I have trainings outside of music therapy, and I'm also a licensed professional counselor in Pennsylvania, but I've always stayed with the music and promote myself as a music psychotherapist if you will because of that aspect that more happens within the music that I can do verbally.
Marisa: Mmhm.
Michael Zanders: Especially with deep psyche concerns that people are vulnerable and resistant to, which they should be from their defenses but music can metaphorically goes around those that's easily to get into those defenses. So Yeah,…
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: I think that's kind of music psychotherapy for me in a nutshell and my training is that starting is in my Master's there was two tracks, music psychotherapy and music medicine. And as part of the music psychotherapy, you had to take a lot of counseling/psych classes at a higher and more credits to become an LPC. And I'll say a difference too in Pennsylvania, the counseling psych has a lot of psychotherapy orientation to it. When I went to Texas, they're not. It’s purely counseling so that includes vocational counseling, school counseling which I had no training in so that's why I say more psychotherapist than a counselor because I’ve worked more music psychotherapy in Pennsylvania and for that matter in Texas too as well. So…
Marisa: Yeah, that reminds me of something that Heather said in her episode about music and social health. She did her thesis on resource-oriented music therapy and she talked a lot about how with those approaches you tend to see kinda more on the East Coast where you are and for some reason that side of the country even in music therapy, but even outside tends to be a little more oriented in psychotherapy than maybe even in Texas or other parts of the country for some reason.
Michael Zanders: You're exactly right. And by the way, I listened to Heather's interview. That was great. It was so cool. I haven't seen her talk to Heather in years, but she was really good.
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: You're right. United States was really, except for the Northeast, and this is not devaluating anything. It's really heavily focused on behavioral/activity- based as you would say, and I'm not gonna get into my rant about that. Europe, Australia and other even Asian countries are more focused on psychotherapy. Yeah, yeah.
Marisa: Yeah. Yeah. It's just so interesting and I think that's where I've kind of gotten. Well, I got a little bit of that here in Texas, but because I think you were here, kind of talking about it and then now being over there. I see just how the approach is very different over here but I've really enjoyed it and as just somebody who has always enjoyed music and has always just enjoyed the general reflection process, it's been really interesting to see music from that way and just I've been reading a lot of music psychotherapy stuff and I'm taking theories of music psychotherapy this semester coming up and…
Michael Zanders: Oh nice.
Marisa: and I'm really excited to talk about it and just to learn more about it and just hear it because everything I read it's like a little light bulb, I feel like, that kind of goes off about me and then in my clinical work and a separate process, but all as a parallel process with the music, which I've really enjoyed. Yeah, and so for those of you listening to you said something earlier that reminded me…so for those of you that are music therapists, I'm sure you've heard this before but for those of you listening who aren't…we have this very common idea in music therapy of the music in the therapy. So it's kind of on a more supportive level. We’re listening to songs. We're talking. We're experiencing music still but then we have versus music as therapy where the music itself is the therapy process. You said something earlier about, without words and I think that's a really good example or a way to be clarify that a little bit of the music itself is the therapy because that's where the process is all happening for the client.
Michael Zanders: Yeah, yeah.
Marisa: And that's mostly what you focus on in your clinical work and your teaching as well to use a lot of music psychotherapy, right?
Michael Zanders: Yeah. And I guess we could say it's more mental health as opposed to physical health or psychophysiological health that you would see more in medicine and medicine.
Marisa: Yeah, yeah.
Michael Zanders: Yeah. Yeah. And that's yes my area of interest/expertise is more in mental health/psyche as you would say.
Marisa: Yeah ‘cause music therapy, as we know, can be in a lot of different settings. You see music therapists in hospitals and you see music therapists in school districts. And in that case, it would be a little more academic-based. It would be more like cognitive goals, maybe physical goals for rehabilitation. This is purely mental health definitely and…
Michael Zanders: Yeah, yeah, right. Yes.
Marisa: we're talking about just our internal processes. Yeah, yeah.
Michael Zanders: Definitely. Yeah, yeah. And this is not to say there's not by products of working on your mental health, you know, but the focus is not there. For example, I could work with someone and we can be working on identity. And they might make changes in their external life based off the work but it wasn't the therapy. It was a byproduct of it. It could be physical or psychophysiological, you know. And that's important to know because there’s a lot of, like, a biopsychosocial approach is that connection. And even though it's the psychology involved in that, it's really the focus is on the mental health and that's important for someone who needs more than that then yeah. I'm not the right person to go to if you will. So, yeah.
Marisa: I really appreciate that perspective too. Just kind of like mind-body or mind-body-spirit almost and…
Michael Zanders: Yeah, yeah.
Marisa: …how even the music - I took that one last semester - and even how just the music like, the psychosomatic responses that we have listening to music or engaging with music. It was really fascinating. And it's really interesting. There’s just so many - that's the thing about this podcast that I'm really excited about is that there's just so many different little subtopics within music and within music therapy, so it's just so cool just to hear from everybody's perspectives in their own little niche, of the little niche bubble of what music therapy is or how music therapy is experienced for everybody. It's different. It's just gonna be different.
Michael Zanders: Yeah and this could be a 50 Hour podcast just on this topic, right or so many different thoughts.
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: Which is good too. Yeah.
Marisa: One thing too that I felt like would be really helpful because I know it's impossible to just explain music psychotherapy or just talk about everything in just one episode or probably even a couple I feel like it takes a lot but one thing I did want to focus on in this episode is just different musical elements and how maybe we can start to take a little deeper look, you know, instead of seeing different elements just from the surface or just the face value of what it is but how that relates to us, what that could mean, how could that be interpreted along the therapy process, or just for general self-reflection because like I said,…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: …that's one that's come up for people for some reason in our polls and stuff. That's something that I think people want to know a little bit more about and something I know I've talked to you about before and that not a lot of people also talk about because we're all kind of doing our own thing in our own areas of this. So I felt like you would be a really great person to maybe share some of your thoughts about some of these musical elements if that's okay.
Michael Zanders: Definitely. And before we start, I'll go on a brief tangent…
Marisa: Always.
Michael Zanders: Yeah I know. I'm on this quest, especially in our field. It's gonna be interesting when people listen this who are not music therapists that we don't use the music enough in our own field. And I don't mean just the music. I mean the musical elements so that's what I'm always trying to promote because we're just saying music but so, for example, my philosophy is much of our mental health deals with our identity and who we are and for us more importantly is who we are musically so when you integrate musical experience into your life, you bring about more meaningful cogent ways of being in the world and you can see yourself in a way you couldn't musically, you know, when you hear your sounds, when you hear your own sounds, it's much different than when you verbalize who you are, but more importantly it's not just listening to the music or using music, but the musical elements are really the key role here in understanding our mental health as we start.
So if you think of pulse, we don't talk about it much, in music and sometimes it's located within the meter or what the musician would say the time, the rhythm if you will, but pulse is foundational. It's how we experience who we are, our physical selves, and it's a connection, we have a continuous pulse and you can recognize them when you're in certain contexts or certain environments. Your pulse may change. I'm not just talking about your heartbeat, but the heartbeat is that, is your pulse. So you get excited, that variability and your heart pulses more. If you're relaxed, your pulse is lessoned. And that's how we know we're connected to ourselves first. So if you work with someone who's got no pulse in the music they lack a pure connection with their physical, substantial self and more importantly their ecology even. And I’ve noticed this is working with youth that are in foster care that they have a hard time with pulse because they can't locate where are physically in their environments and…
Marisa: their identity…
Michael Zanders: Yeah, but what another side of it too is some the music listener who listens to a lot of rap and in Hip Hop particularly more rap and it's all pulse which means that they can't separate from their environment. It’s like, that’s why a lot of the rap music is about expressing their life because it's so pulse oriented and physical and rhythmical that it's really saying I can't get out of this environment. That's where my pulse and more of my identity is and good and bad. It's nice to be connected to your culture but that also is where most of your, well not most of your, it’s where your concerns come from too at times, you know. It’s trying to transcend that ecology sometimes in yourself and then when you go with pulse if you talk about phrasing with that, and you're phrasing in song and phrasing from a musical term is the length of a melody if you will or phrasing, let's say four measures or I don't know how to explain this purely musically without going off for another hour.
But like for example, the shapes and lengths of phrases are linked to the ideas in your mental health of pressure versus release or confinement versus freedom so longer phrases, people in singing, if they do longer phrases, you can sense more freedom. They're more able to express. If they're short phrases and their breath is short and cut off, they’re confined internally and pressured and they can't find a release.
So instead of going the outside world where music therapy we always say, well, if you have ADHD, that means you're impulsive so they're gonna impulsive in music. No, let's look at what is the music saying and then relate it to talk to their other fields about their psychology. So even when in my practice and I'm working with case managers and stuff, I still talk musically and I'll explain it but I'll say, you know, this person, I'm really working on melody with them because we're trying to work on self expression. But I don't start off with self-expression. I say melody. Or I say…
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: …hey, I'm working on relationships with them. So we're using variables such like a ground and a figure to help with them understanding musical relationships like harmony which is a relationship instead of going hey, let's just work on a relationship. No, let’s work on it musically.
Marisa: Yeah..
Michael Zanders: And we forget that in our field. The story I use for this and I've said this a lot and probably. A lot of students would get on my case about “the only way out is through” but the idea, listen if you're not able to go somewhere in the music, like you said the clients aren't going to be able to go. You've got to be able to go but if you're gonna want to do this mental health and work with someone and emotionally then you've got to go there too.
And I use the story of a guy’s walking down a street and falls in a hole and he's asking for help and the first personal walks by, like a religious leader, a pastor, rabbi, whatever and a guy says, “Hey can help me out the hole”, and the religious leader throws down a prayer or something. Helpful, but not getting him out the hole. The next person I passes by, the guys, “Hey can you get me out the hole?”, and the person throws down a sandwich or a drink or something. It helps them, but doesn't get him out of the hole. The next guy comes by and the guy goes, “Hey, can you get me out of the hole?”, and the guy walking by jumps in the hole. And the guy in the hole says, “What are you doing now? We're both stuck”. And he goes, “No, I've been in this hole before. I know the way out.” That's what being in music therapy in mental health is. And you gotta have your own therapy with that. I've been in the hole before, I can know the way out. If you're not willing to be in that hole for yourself, then there's no way you'll be able to help other people get out of the metaphorical hole.
Marisa: No, it's true much less through music…just in general.
Michael Zanders: Exactly, right.
Marisa: I think And I wish there was more training in this kind of stuff, which is also why I wanted to talk about it just to get just for so people can know that there is that out there and if you are looking for that, there's trainings for this. There's people that think like this even though sometimes it does feel like in certain spots, you can be alone with this type of thinking. You’re not. There are definitely people that feel this way too about music. So why don't we talk about some of the other music elements too? Because I think that was a really helpful example about how some of these yeah so why don't we talk about some of the other music elements too? Because I think that was a really helpful example about how some of these yeah.
Michael Zanders: So, melody. And I said it's a part of identity but think of melody as an expression of a specific feeling, a wish ,or desire, right? And everyone knows what a melody is. So, for example, if a client’s doing unchanging melodies that like they’re really, really short and specific. Like, for example the Shaggy song, “It Wasn’t Me”. That's the whole song. That melody “It wasn't me”. That reveals an obsession with the feeling or compulsion to repeat one’s past, but constantly…so most of the popular songs we listen to, you know what I'm talking about on the radio…radio?…Spotify. They're all about fickle feelings. It's all about love and relationships. They're short melodies, but if you think of like constantly changing melodies or long melodies or melodies that are very.. they change within the phrasing, revealing that feelings are kind of fickle and unstable or they’re not formed. So think of a lot of the Pink Floyd songs where there's no like ABAB kind of form. It's just a melody and it changes melody. That means they don't really know what the feeling is yet.
Marisa: Mmm.
Michael Zanders: So if you look at it like that, you can see someone who can't get a melody…they might not know what the feeling really is. So you might have to go into another musical element to start to connect them to it.
Marisa: Okay.
Michael Zanders: Like, hey let’s do an improvisation and play what it feels like, and then you try to work that is that sound like that feeling, that way instead of saying, “what are you feeling” say, “Can you play what you're feeling?” and then you get into harmony. So harmony kind of reveals attitudes or values concerning what is being expressed and it's also our relationship with others and how we relate to others. It's the psychosocial. So for example, slow harmonies will elicit reflection on a relationship, but fast harmonies, really quick harmonies, give melody urgency and inspire action to that relationship.
So, if you think of the songs…Simon and Garfunkel are great with harmonies, probably the best group with harmonies. Some of the songs, the harmonies, are really quick. The melodies are very quick and the harmonies are very quick. Some of them are slow like “The Sound of Silence” is reflection on…wait, we're making all this music and no one's listening to it and not that they're listening to them. But we're trying to do all the stuff in the society and no one's doing anything. That's a reflection.
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: That's why the harmonies are slow but then you get a fast harmony like “and here's to you Mrs. Robinson”…what’s that one…Mrs. Robinson. That's just, you know, that relationship. They already understand that relationship and it's just a reflection on it. You know what I mean? Yeah.
Marisa: Yeah, and you know, I was ready, speaking of melody and harmony and building those…I was reading a little bit and one that really stuck out to me was like tonality. And just…
Michael Zanders: Yes.
Marisa: how it gives such a shape. I think it was described as almost like a home and…
Michael Zanders: Yes.
Marisa: Like a home center. And then it was just really interesting how they, I think it might have been a Bruscia book or it might’ve been another music psychotherapy book that I was reading. And just that idea of like, how you even build the home and construct the home what notes you're picking what scales, what modes, and then kind of how it creates kind of a little framework internally for…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: how you want to express yourself and how you want to create, those melodies and how the harmonies fit in and there was a lot of really interesting stuff. I think also talked about it as a map. I think that's how it was described, maybe as a map along the journey and they tied it into different archetypes even with melodies and how different songs, different melodies can reflect different archetypes that we experience in different ways. I don't know if you have any thoughts on that, but that was just something that came up for me.
Michael Zanders: Yeah, Mike Viega’s dissertation was on the hero's journey as archetype with hip hop songs, which was really, really, really powerful.
So it's funny I think it's important for this podcast for people listening is that you don't have to be a musician when we're talking about tonality. We're talking about it's a key if you will so there's a starting note as we know it in being trained musicians, there's that we call a starting note, and ending note, it's an octave and all the notes are based off this key, but
Marisa: Like Do Re Mi. Yeah.
Michael Zanders: Yeah, exactly, right. Yeah and tonality is the same thing, but you can be in different keys or sometimes we call them as modes but you don't be musician to know where the resting spot is of a piece of music. I’ve work with so many people they know.. they start, let's say we’re in a key of C. They start on a C and they're doing a bunch notes. They'll come back to that starting note because they know intuitively from listening to music forever that it's got a, what we call the tonic, the grounding note or chord of that key and you can tell when people who don't have any grounding because they never can return home. They never find their key or their tonality and…
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: …even not being musicians. It's really simple and non-musicians understand suspensions , but I mean, they might not say it's a 4-3 suspense or 2-1 suspension, but they know when there is a suspension in music because they can feel it because it's natural in music in all cultures to have musical elements of tonality and suspensions, all of that. They all have that structure in whatever key, if you’re using a Raj in India where there’s quarter tones being used. It still has the structure that everyone knows so it's so key that emphasize you don't have to be musician as a client to see that people are musical. Yeah.
Marisa: Yeah. And you said something about the suspensions and I think that to me it goes back to the tension and the release of music.
Michael Zanders: yep, exactly, right
Marisa:: And we know when there's tension you can feel it whether you can recognize what it is or not. Specifically, that there's some type of tension and you can expect or hope that that tension
Michael Zanders: will resolve. Yeah.
Marisa:…will be released. Like leaving the song for the musician listening leaving a song on a five.
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: That would not feel right but there are some moments. I think that internally we do feel unresolved or…
Michael Zanders: Yes.
Marisa: ….a feeling is still unresolved. Situations feel unresolved and that could mirror that type of experience too because you said something about, you know, you don't sometimes come back to the home. You don't come back to the grounded one and…
Michael Zanders: Yeah, yeah.
Marisa: sometimes you stay there for a little bit and sometimes you need to and that’s okay!
Michael Zanders: So going back to that, Brucia, said, “where there's tension in music there is need. That is the meaning”.
Marisa: Ooof.
Michael Zanders: Yeah, it's a beautiful comment of that's exactly right. That's where the resistance is. That’s where the need is. You go there and it's funny you're talking about, we'll say the tonic or the ground or however, we want to use it that the home base note right…that if people are stuck around there they can't leave. It's just a significant if you could never turn back, there's gotta be a balance or…
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: a variability of coming back sometimes and sometimes finding that freedom or being able to separate from the ground base and going away.
I worked with this one client where I was improvising on a piano and they were stuck in this note and in the key we were in, whatever key it was, they kept playing the four and I was on the one so it was a suspension, F and E, a 4-3 suspension. They kept staying there and you can hear it. That's so much tension. They wouldn’t end it and I was even, at some point was trying to emphasize it. I would go back to the five really quick.
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: And then I go back to the one and still be doing that F but right and it was horrible. It was great. I could see that they were fighting not coming back, not and it's fine that's where they needed to be and eventually in future sessions we did resolve it and it came out there was something unresolved that we really need to work on, but I never would have known if I didn't hear musically.
Marisa: And it's okay…
Michael Zanders: That tension…
Marisa: I think that sometimes it's easy to shy away from it or to not want to hold on to it or even talk about it. But I think that's the beautiful thing about music in this context. Is that sometimes it's easier or more friendly or more welcoming, to feel it in the music because it's so familiar to us when we hear songs.
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: So even I know you mentioned melodies and harmonies, but even the chord progressions, I think can mirror those types of experiences too. I'm gonna have to look into that dissertation you're talking about about the hero’s journey because that's a big one. I think it comes up for a lot of people at different times in your life and…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: And we see it. You see that archetype in a lot of things even like, for anybody spiritual listening, the prodigal son. I think about that. You leave and then you come back home. And it's the same thing in music. It's that tension you leave you go on a journey, and then ideally you would come back and…
Michael Zanders: yeah.
Marisa: you would resolve a different person because you're never the same after that experience.
Michael Zanders: And not to be sexist the heroine's journey as well, too. Yeah, I mean, it's just, very similar journey,…
Marisa: Mm- Yeah.
Michael Zanders: …that quest to slay the dragon in your life. That's the journey and the archetype of that and you're right every culture has that. There is that archetypal aspect of religions too, a vision quest the Native American called it, that journey of finding yourself or going out, so yes, that's exactly right. Yeah. Yeah.
Marisa: I think it's so interesting and I think that's what this podcast is going to be about mainly is that when you're in the music, the parallel process that happens in your life. It kind of mirrors that in different ways and…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: I love looking at the individual music elements too. Are there anything we're missing that you wanted to mention. I know we did melody. We did harmony. We talked about meter… Tempo. Was there any other ones?
Michael Zanders: When we talk about tempo. I would say this really quick…tempo…specifically faster tempos create a need for higher level of organization. Think about when you’re cleaning your house or exercising. You need to organize and…
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: faster tempos will do that. I mean, you can't exercise to I don't know listening to Enya…
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: Yeah, or someone like that while you're exercising or cleaning your house, right but slower tempos create a need to fill the space, to find a connection to something greater or more meaningful than himself. That's why you use slower tempos with relaxation or mindfulness. You're trying to create a space of more reflection or meaning in your life. It's a difference between reflecting and restructuring. So if you're working with a client and your tempos are always slow they're reflecting a lot, but maybe they need some structure. So, you might want to go towards the tempo. It's always that balance. You don't want to ever have the extremes of it, if you will. But if they're always quick tempos, they're always trying to organize themselves and no reflection, so those are really key.
Marisa: Mmm.
Michael Zanders: That it's not just a speed but tempo does play a key role in all of our lives. So yeah. Yeah I wanted to say that about tempo so…
Marisa: Yeah, I had seen that too now that you mention it. It was kind of like, I think they talk about it as how you move through time and space is kind of in rhythm and…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: in tempo is just like how are you moving through this time and space whether it's like the different rhythms that you create or just the tempo that you choose. That's kind of I think was the idea that I had seen. Just how are you going about the world.
Michael Zanders: Yeah, and you know this…
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: and through all my years of practicing and different trainings, earlier on it was heavily psychodynamic and humanistic and then I got another things. I'm heavily focused now on existential aspects of it. And the reason why is because that ideas of this transcends all ideas and cultures. The idea is we all are live and we all die and that idea of existentialism is finding that meaning and purpose in life. And that life, your first idea of existence is dreadful, that when you come into the world we call it the existential screen when a baby cries. That's their first voice. That's their first musical element. So from the beginning existentialism is music, meaning that everything we do is representing our life. So that cry of life is like, “I’m here. I'm here everyone” and also the baby saying “son of a…”…
Michael Zanders: “I'm out in this world. I don't have this comfort of the womb and being taken. Now I'm here in this world”. I don't realize yet, that's an existential crisis like no other and…
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: So I think a lot of the music elements I use a lot are from an existential concept of how do they create to our life worlds, our beings, our perspective. So people listening, just remember that all the music elements we could be put in a different context based on different theories or philosophies. And so I really focus from an existential and also a psychodynamic one too of the subconscious and finding patterns and themes and in your life. So take that as you will. Yeah.
Marisa: I love that example. I always mess with my brother because he hates change. Oh man. He’s like a big boat that's slow to turn around, you know,
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: And he was in the womb for three extra weeks and I always tell them, “That was your starting point. You've never liked change”.
Michael Zanders: Yeah!
Marisa: You've never been good with transitions. That's what that reminded of …
Michael Zanders: Yeah, yeah.
Marisa: Man, even from the get-go you were not ready to let go. I always tease him about it.
Michael Zanders: I see it's that my stuff. I love to assess his pulse in that because that's where pulse comes from the heartbeat. It comes from the umbilical cord. Babies come down the tube. I know it's not that big of a tube but they come down in a pulse too when you're coming out when you're birthing.
Marisa: That's true, the contractions, everything.
Michael Zanders: That’s exactly right. The contractions are all pulse. They're all meter.
Marisa: They’re timed even! Yeah.
Michael Zanders: The mother’s heartbeat is 2:1 to the baby’s, so that's your first connection to musical existentialism is he didn't want to leave the pulse, warm pulse. Once it started clicking an upcoming out that tube the baby he was like, I”'m not leaving. I’m staying here. Nope”.
Marisa: “No, this is not for me. I'm real comfy. I'm good.”
Michael Zanders: Yeah. That's right.
Marisa: “I could live my whole life like this. I'm fine.”
Michael Zanders: “I'm staying with this womb pulse where everything is ambient and warm”. Also you can see that the music too. I've worked with people where they've had real birth - I'm not saying your brother here - but real birth like cesarean section or birth comps like they've had, before cesarean, they had the cord around the neck. You can hear that kind of stuff in music and pulse. I mean, you don't see it right away, but after talking with them, you can start to see real early life crises that occur in music and…
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: around particularly around pulse. Yeah.
Marisa: That's so interesting. We're gonna have to do maybe a separate episode about each one of these.
Michael Zanders: I know.
Marisa: Yeah, I love that and that kind of reminds me if we’re talking about just those sudden changes and…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: Sudden change in experiences and I would think that even key changes maybe kind of mirror that in some way in abrupt…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: You know, some songs kind of lean into it with a pivot chord and then sometimes there's not a smooth transition.
Michael Zanders: Right. Yeah.
Marisa: It's an abrupt key change. And I would imagine that maybe there's something going on there, with that too. If just that sense of an urgency or just something's happening. Something big is happening and…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: it focuses the attention again, like what just happened. A big change, like a big change.
Michael Zanders: But they don't know what it is yet. That's okay. We need to hear it first before you know what it is. Yeah quick changes like that are unrefined thoughts, feelings, needs. Typically, yeah.
Marisa: Yeah, would you say a lot of this? How much do you think and this is a super rough guesstimation…how much of this do you think is conscious and how much do you think of it is unconscious in these experiences. Just maybe like a ballpark. I know it's impossible to have that kind of context…
Michael Zanders: No, no, I think it's all I look for….it's all Consciousness if you will so Jung had a different idea that Freud did with, you now pre-conscious so I think people are conscious of certain things. And I know, working with clients that they're saying “I'm playing this feeling but I really know what this is about” and they do right? Sometimes they don't, but when you do with more what we call reconstructive psychotherapy, it takes longer term and you really have to do a lot of music and improvisations and really see the patterns and themes and to really bring up what parts of the subconscious are really being defending and not up there and it can be very painful emotionally and difficult for people. I know from my own experience of receiving that type of therapy and why coming home and just getting in the fetal position in the bed because I was just mostly pained and it was a struggle and it was heartbreaking and hard and hard to verbalize and so it depends I think there's different moments where you're aware of your consciousness. And it's not readily tangible or…
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: it's more abstract…yeah.
Marisa: Yeah, and just in my own experiences, I think so I know now we talked about the elements specifically but just in general now kind of zooming out a little bit in a song in general, one thing that really stuck out with me somewhere along the way I was reading the Dynamics of Music Psychotherapy, the Brucia book and…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: …there's a chapter on induced song recall. I think there's two, one for conscious and one for unconscious or subconscious…
Michael Zanders: Induced song recall. Yeah, yeah.
Marisa: And the idea is that for those of you that may not be familiar with that, the idea is that the songs that we listen to whether they pop up in our head spontaneously or whether it's something that we heard and it's stuck with us and really resonated with us and we're holding on to it, is that they definitely mirror different experiences, life experiences, emotional states things like that that we go through and that's kind of something that stuck out to me too. And I never really thought about it. I mean, I know generally, the times we resonate with tend to… it's for a reason we're connecting with that song first specific reason, whether it's the lyrics whether it's the music elements individually but something about the songs usually take. And I've noticed that I've had my own experience is where I've listened to songs and I'm like there is nothing to this song. It's just stuck in my head. There's nothing to this. It's just a song I'm thinking about and then I really sit with it and I'm like, “Oh no”.
Michael Zanders: I know. I hear you. Yup.
Marisa: And there's all this stuff that I got to work through but my point is, I think that that's the beautiful thing about music, is that sometimes even if we're conscious of it if we're not aware of these experiences, there's something about the music that will bring it out. So it makes it more tangible, I think, so that you can experience process it in a different way, in a physical way.
Michael Zanders: Yeah, definitely, and a meaningful way too.
Marisa: Mm-hmm
Michael Zanders: Speaking of that book of the Dynamics of Music Psychotherapy by Bruscia… one of my favorite music therapy quotes is from that book. If you don't mind, I'll just quote it, right.
Marisa: Please yeah, is it the songs one? Because I love that one.
Michael Zanders: Yes, yes.
Marisa: Okay. Yes! Yay, please read it to them.
Michael Zanders: So “Songs are ways that human beings explore emotions. They express who we are and how we feel they bring us closer to others. They keep us company when we are alone. They articulate our beliefs and values. As years past songs bear witness to our lives. They allow us to relive the past, to examine the present, and to voice our dreams for the future. Songs tell stories of our joys and sorrows. They reveal our innermost secrets and they express our hopes and disappointments, our fears and triumphs. They are our musical diaries, our life stories. They are the sounds of our personal development.”
Marisa: Hmmm.
Michael Zanders: I know.
Marisa: That’a keeper.
Michael Zanders: Yeah, such a beautiful quote. Yeah.
Marisa: Mm- I always enjoy his readings. I feel like the way that he articulates topics like this is like that one that's just yeah,…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: That's it for me.
Michael Zanders: Exactly right. I try to be intellectualized about stuff sometimes and I'm like crap I could’ve just said it just like that. It's so eloquent. Simple but so profound. It does say something.
Marisa: Yeah. Yeah.
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: Because a lot of ways our songs and I talked about A little bit in our opening episode about it's called “You Are What You Listen To” and it’s true.
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: I think the songs like it said in that quote. There are life experiences. Those stories are our stories for that moment that we need them or hear them or…
Michael Zanders: Yeah. Yeah.
Marisa: …want to look back on them and all those songs everything and maybe even the individual element. That melody was us for that moment, things like that.
Michael Zanders: Yeah. Yeah and that's another side note too as a music psychotherapist/music therapist is the client’s songs. Not ours. What think of a song, “Oh this is a great song about forgiveness or love or Joy or whatever”. Okay fine for you it is, but don't use it with a client unless they're using …
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: Let them their songs, their preferred songs.
Marisa: Yeah. and even…
Michael Zanders: So yeah. Because that’s their life journey. They're not coming to you for your life journey. They're coming there for their life journey,…
Marisa: Yeah. And that's…
Michael Zanders: So yeah.
Marisa: where being a therapist is just so complicated. I think yeah that that's…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: That’s where I think a lot of those countertransference and transference that comes out and if you're like, no, this is just a different playing field and a lot to think about. There's a lot to navigate when you see the depths of every little element in every little experience. There's a lot to think about and a lot to process at the same time for us individually and for the client individually and then for the music that we're making together too. It's a lot of levels here. Yeah.
Michael Zanders: Yeah. definitely. I mean you can never cover this in one podcast. Yeah, it’s so much. There are times when I first started, I didn't even want to listen to music, my own music, when I got home because I was using other people's music doing music for others all day long, and I just felt so disconnected until I realized I need to have my own music too. It's okay and listen to what I want us to even if I know I can listen to my music without reading into it as well. Sometimes I do like sometimes this music for pure pleasure and say screw it. I’m just listening for I don't want to find any meaning in this. I just want to enjoy.
Marisa: I'm sure there's the meaning but I'm not gonna look into it.
Michael Zanders: I'm not worried about it. I'm not my own therapist, This is my so yeah, yeah.
Marisa: Yeah. yeah, no, I totally relate to that in a lot of ways and I think it's hard sometimes to musically, I think at least for me. I felt like my own music identity got lost a little bit in my first couple years of working because I was so submerged musically and…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: learning songs and learning our cultural music here in the valley and learning all these things which was so important. I needed, I absolutely needed to do that. And then it kind of changed me in a different way that I didn't expect. I came out the other side a very different musician with a lot of different contexts and new songs that I didn't even know that I was gonna, enjoy or songs I didn't even know existed that I found along the way and eventually that kind of shaped my own musical identity, but even that process was very interesting for me too and…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: it's just funny how it changes as we've moved through life. It changes too. It's gonna keep changing. It's never the same.
Michael Zanders: Definitely Yeah. I agree.
Marisa: Yeah well I guess that leads me to the last thing I wanted to ask you just about and I think you kind of answered it a little bit if there's anything else you want to share just about how all of this has kind of changed your own connection to music or…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: what has that been like for you see music in this way and then as a musician on your own, someone who just enjoys music on your spare time.
Michael Zanders: Yeah. I think you hit it, right. I go through stages. Ido honor client music or even students when I'm doing experiences in class and listening to those music later on and really trying to be put myself in their position and listen to that song. It's another form of working on my own countertransference, but for example for client was in a song and I don't know it I'll listen to it, but then I'll go home and listen to it. There's moments and stages where I need to do that. There's also moments where I’ll be into a particular genre for no reason. Like, a couple months ago. I got into listening to classic rock music but by orchestras like Pink Floyd, like…it was just really like, I tried I don't listen to classic music is like classical music as I do, but there's times my life where I only listen to that. There's times when I'm only listening to my grunge period. There’s times where I'm listening to other people's music. I know those stages and I'm giving myself forgiveness to not always… I can enjoy my own life musically how want to do it too. You know, if I want to just learn a new song to play it or I hear a song and just go to the piano player or improvise to give myself that opportunity.
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: And to not just always analyze it, through elements. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Marisa: Thank you for sharing that. I think everybody listening hopefully has a little bit to take from this and maybe even just a starting point of if there's anything that kind of stood out to you about any of this just knowing and I said this earlier, but just knowing that you can look a little deeper when you need to. And then maybe sometimes you don't need to and that's okay, too. But for any music therapists out there maybe any students…
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa:…that are interested on this side of music therapy. Just knowing that that is an option to explore and for the musicians out there, maybe challenging you to see music in a different way, in a new way, that maybe you haven't thought about before. Yeah.
Michael Zanders: Yeah, I like it. I would say if music therapists out there ,students are listening to just quote, “Don't hear the music, listen to the music”. When all else fails, just stay with the music, and listen to it. Be present to it and stop thinking about what to do or what type of music to do. Just let the client experience your music be with it. and it'll help guide you as much as your own thoughts will. Or just take a chance if you will of listening to yourclients music and…
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: not worrying about doing. You know? And be okay with that don't be so afraid of the music as music therapists as we are…
Marisa: Yeah.
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: It's scary. It can be.
Michael Zanders: It can be. It can also be your way out be just transcending, the unexplainable of connection and…
Marisa: Mmm
Michael Zanders: of not being able to verbalize how open and amazingly it can feel when you get through the other side, So yeah.
Marisa: Yeah. Yeah, I think that that's a beautiful note to end on here is that I think that kind of just sums it all up actually.
Michael Zanders: Yeah.
Marisa: Yeah. Yeah. thank you so much for being here and I do want to share that for those of you listening. We have some polls now on Spotify and so there'll be a couple questions if anybody wants to talk a little bit more about their experiences. There’s space to do there. There's space to ask questions and there's all some space to leave voice memos. So if there's something specific maybe that you heard in this episode that you'd like a little more clarification on or you'd like maybe some more resources to look into that. Let us know and I'm sure both of us would be more than happy to either talk about it in a later episode or even just share some resources somehow and respond on social media or on our blog post. We do have a blog post for every episode that has the transcript and links to any books, articles ,anything that we might have talked about will all be linked there too. So you can connect with that.
Michael Zanders: Yeah, thanks for having me on here, too. Oh you’re probably tired of listening to me Marisa so…
Marisa: Never
Michael Zanders: No, I appreciate it though. I’m honored and humbled and passionate about music. And not just the therapy part. You know what I mean? Yeah.
Marisa: Yeah. Yeah.
Michael Zanders: Yeah, so I mean, thank you.
Marisa: Yeah, thanks for being here and thank you everybody listening. We'll talk to you soon.
Michael Zanders: Awesome. Great. Bye!
Marisa: Bye!
