.jpg)
As part of a clinical placement during my music therapy studies, my co-therapist and I worked in a large South African township, Mamelodi (just outside of Pretoria), for six months. We worked at a walk-in HIV/AIDS counseling center and adopted a Community Music Therapy model, as session attendance was irregular, participation in other counseling sessions was unpredictable, and various factors influenced the influx of people on any given day.We occasionally grew weary of the unpredictability of the placement, which made session planning, goal setting, and forming meaningful therapeutic relationships with clients very difficult, as we were unsure if they would return the following week. At times, the destitute nature of this placement deeply affected us; we encountered rape, abandonment, kidnapping, illness, feelings of despair and hopelessness from week to week. And we experienced such need. I worked with an eleven year old girl who had been kidnapped, another young adult who had been raped, and many children orphaned and left helpless by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. It was tough work and disheartening to return on a weekly basis.So we made a decision to try something different. We arrived in Mamelodi on a bright and beautiful Pretoria morning with as many djembes as we could carry, determined to engage with the community on another level. We were tired of feeling tired and needed to try a new approach. We handed out a few flyers in the area encouraging community members to join us in an open drumming circle and communal musicking. We were apprehensive and unsure about whether people would actually arrive, but they did! As a few children sat down to drum with us, they attracted the attention of others passing by, who, in turn, joined us. Adults, children, carers and nurses from the center, my co-therapist, and I all engaged in a vibrant, joyous music-making experience on what began as an ordinary Saturday morning. We employed various techniques (call and response, turn-taking, singing of traditional songs), and let the music take us where it needed to go. The response? Incredible and unexpected. The music? Spirited, dynamic, vibrant. The call: answered.Tanya Brown, Registered Music Therapist, WFMT Student Delegate for Africa
