This art also stimulates cognition, communication, and motor coordination, facilitating emotional expression and socialization.
Music is important for cognitive development. Photo: Freepik
Music is more than entertainment. It's also therapy, and it's important for artists to understand this medicinal aspect. In fact, it's with this in mind that the National School of Music in Maputo is promoting a music therapy training program, aiming to share knowledge on the therapeutic use of musical rhythms.
This training is an initiative of the "Building with Music" project and aims to support the Mozambican government in addressing two issues: promoting employment and self-employment among young Mozambicans, and boosting the cultural sector so that it can express its full economic and social potential.
Participants are taught about the power of music therapy, that is, the use of music to promote physical and mental health, improving mood, and reducing stress and anxiety.
This art also stimulates cognition, communication, and motor coordination, facilitating emotional expression and socialization. It has also proven effective in neurological and psychiatric treatments, and in child development and rehabilitation of various conditions. The sessions at the National School of Music are taught by Gustavo Schulz Gattino, a Brazilian specialist in Music Therapy, who has shared his experience in this area with the course students, preparing them to become future music therapy instructors.
During the activities, students are taught that the focus is on the person or group to whom the treatment is directed; thus, the process concentrates on the needs, potential, emotions, and memories of a specific patient or community.
It is taken into account that music therapy is still a poorly structured and little-known area within the formal health and education systems in the country and the continent in general, although some isolated projects linked to this initiative exist, but they are limited by the lack of training institutions and regulation of this sector.
