Catching up…
Kia ora e hoa (Hello friend), 2024 has been and gone, and I feel.. exhausted, but fulfilled and proud of all the music therapy milestones that I can now look back on which have made up my first year in practice.
The year that was
In September, I attended the New Zealand Music Therapy conference. This year was a particularly big event due to it aligning with the 50 year anniversary of Music Therapy in New Zealand. There were over 50 presenters from all around the world.
The seminars were so affirming and inspiring, I have taken away lots of theoretical and practical ideas for my practice. It was also a great time for catching up with classmates and connecting other music therapists around the motu.
New Music Therapists and our treasured lecturers and mentors in a celebratory pose at conference.
I was lucky enough to present my student research project, which centred on the use of community music therapy as a responsive intervention for a community impacted by cyclone Gabrielle.
Presenting student research project to a room of conference attendees.
During the conference I became the new student liaison and council member of ‘Music Therapy New Zealand’, the governing organisation which regulates and advocates for Music Therapy here in Aotearoa.
In May I received a significant amount of funding from Creative New Zealand to develop an inclusive band mentorship programme which is now called LOUD & PROUD.
This project has been a huge source of fulfillment and joy in my practice. I get to collaborate with music specialists and disability support services to create an open space for musicians with disabilities to access local music venues and events and be affirmed and supported to lead the way in realising their musical aspirations.
One highlight of this project so far has been putting on a public concert as part of our local fringe festival in Hawkes Bay
LOUD & PROUD community hosting a music making event for ‘Fringe in the Stings’ 2024.
Finally I finished this year attending my Te Herenga Waka, Victoria university graduation in Wellington, walking alongside my incredibly talented cohort of graduate music therapists.
Shaking hands with University Vice Chancellor at graduation ceremony.
Graduation photo with lecturers and classmates.
2024 was an exciting year full of new experiences, an ushering into the professional season of my life, from student to graduate. From role playing therapy scenarios with teachers and classmates, to building nurturing therapeutic relationships with real people. I’m continually learning to allow myself to be proudly shaped by the therapeutic relationship I share with participants/clients/musicians and will finish with a quote that has stuck with me this year.
““It is sad to think of being together with others for so long and yet never to have let them matter enough to be influenced and changed by them. I urge you to let your [participants] matter to you, to let them enter your mind, influence you, change you—and not to conceal this from them.””
I’m looking forward to what 2025 will bring and am hoping for more balance and calm in this ever increasingly busy and time poor world.
