Assessment Coversheet Faculty of Arts, Design and Media

and Feedback Form Conservatoire

Complete the details marked in the coloured text and leave everything else blank. Where appropriate, copy and paste your
submission after the first pages as indicated. You are reminded of the University regulations on cheating. Except where the
assessment is group-based, the final piece of work which is submitted must be your own work. Close similarity between
submissions is likely to lead to an investigation for cheating. You must submit a file in an MSWord or equivalent format as tutors
will use MSWord to provide feedback including, where appropriate, annotations in the text.

Student Name Ivonne Tatiana Porras Ocampo Reasonable Adjustments

Student Number 16101092 The Faculty has notified me that I

am eligible for a Reasonable
Course and Year MMus1/MMus2/PGDip (student to delete as appropriate) Adjustment (including additional
time) in relation to the marking of
Module Code MUS7013 this assessment.

Module Title Music, Community and Wellbeing Yes/No (delete as appropriate)

Assessment Title Evaluation Please note that action may be taken under the
University’s Student Disciplinary Procedure against
any student making a false claim for Reasonable
Module Tutor Kate Fawcett and Luan Shaw Adjustments.

First Marker
Kate Fawcett Date: 4th May 2019
Name:
Feedback: General comments on the quality of the work, its successes and where it could be improved
Your introduction makes reference to the work of Malloch and Trevarthen, offering a succinct Provisional Uncapped Mark
explanation of Communicative Musicality, a concept you return to in your concluding section. Marks will be capped if this
was a late submission or resit
You begin the main body of the essay by explaining a three-pronged approach to Early assessment and may be
Years workshops, focusing on imagination, education and interaction. You relate your moderated up or down by the
subsequent discussion of your EYFS workshops to these concepts convincingly. Your examination board.

discussion is largely descriptive of process, rather than delving deeper into responses and
motivations, but a clear idea of the deliveries is conveyed. You move on to discuss the very Evaluation 58%
different experience of taking music onto the geriatric wards in a hospital setting. You
describe some moving interactions and are honest about your own reactions to the Deliveries 61.5%
environment. Your realisation that one song can be performed in several different moods
Unrounded
feels like an important part of your learning journey and you are able to consider feedback
constructively. You make some useful comparisons between devising music deliveries for overall mark
the hospital and school settings. Your conclusion demonstrates your understanding of the 58.875%
importance and flexibility of live music in myriad contexts.
Rounded final
mark 59%
Feed Forward: How to apply the feedback to future submissions
You refer to a variety of appropriate literature by paraphrasing – some direct quotations (including page numbers) would lend
more weight to your points. Now try to deepen your analysis of your experiences in order to achieve richer insights and learning.

Quality and use of Standard English and Academic Conventions

Spelling Errors Standard is a Cause for Concern

Grammatical Errors
If the box above has been ticked you should arrange
Punctuation Errors a consultation with a member of staff from the Centre
for Academic Success via Success@bcu.ac.uk
Inappropriate Structure

Moderation: To ensure your mark is fair, a cross section of work is moderated by another member of staff. If your work was part
of the sample, this is indicated in the box below.

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I agree with Kate’s points above. While this is often rather descriptive, it is also honest and demonstrates your commitment to
this kind of work.

Moderator Name: Luan Shaw Date: 13 May 2019

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Marking Guidelines – please study these pages carefully
Learning Outcome 39 or below 40-49 Fail
1. Deploy musical Practical and/or Workshop delivery will be
expertise, written work is very poorly prepared with
interpersonal and weak and displays a minimal attempts to engage
organizational skills to fundamental lack of the participants and a lack
communicate understanding of the of enthusiasm and
effectively with clients aims of the module conviction. Rapport with the
in different community and/or the participants is limited due to
settings; requirements for poor presentational skills:
work at this level. e.g. insufficient clarity and
projection of speech, limited
eye contact, lack of
fluency/continuity.
Playing/singing is weak and
uncommunicative, with no
attempt to play/sing from
memory or improvise (if
appropriate). Activities are
mostly inappropriate for the
participants and the context,
and the opportunity for
interaction is limited. The
student is not a confident
leader and appears unable
to think on his/her feet.
Planning is likely to
comprise inappropriate
content and/or leave no
room for flexibility. Time
management and pacing
will be poor and leadership
roles will not be equally
balanced.
2. Demonstrate The rationale demonstrates
awareness of the insufficient awareness of
professional context of workshop strategies
50-59 Pass
Workshop delivery will be
adequately prepared with
a satisfactory level of
engagement, and some
enthusiasm/conviction.
Rapport with the
participants will be
established with functional
presentational skills but
there is likely to be a lack
of flair and occasional
slips in fluency/continuity.
Playing/singing is fairly
confident and, where
appropriate, there is some
willingness to perform
from memory and/or
improvise. Activities are
suitable for the
participants and the
context, and include some
opportunities for
interaction. The student is
a fairly confident leader
with some ability to think
on his/her feet. Planning
will be suitable for the
context, though may lack
variety and there may be
little room for flexibility.
Time management and
pacing will be adequate
and leadership roles will
be reasonably equally
balanced.
The rationale
demonstrates sufficient
awareness of workshop
3
60-69 Commendation
Workshop delivery will
be well prepared with
clear evidence of
engagement,
enthusiasm and
conviction. There will be
a good rapport with
participants through
effective communication
(both social and musical
aspects), and a
confident, manner.
Playing/singing is
confident and
communicative, and
performance from
memory/improvisation
(where appropriate) is
effective. Activities show
awareness of the
participants’ needs and
offer a good range of
opportunities for
interaction. The student
is a confident leader
with an ability to think on
his/her feet. Planning
will be carefully thought
through, and include
variety whilst allowing
for some flexibility. Time
management and
pacing will be good and
leadership roles will be
equally balanced.
The rationale will be well
detailed and organised,
demonstrating good
70-79 Distinction 80 and above
Workshop delivery will be This category is
extremely well prepared, awarded for work that
demonstrating an meets the criteria for
outstanding level of distinction and is
engagement, enthusiasm sufficiently strong in
and conviction. There will content and
be an excellent rapport presentation not to be
with participants through out of place in a
highly effective professional context.
communication,
sensitivity, awareness,
and a confident, friendly
manner. Playing/singing is
excellent, showing
musicality, spontaneity
and invention, to include
memorization and
improvisation. Planning
will be imaginative,
leaving room for flexibility
as appropriate. Time
management and pacing
will be excellent and
leadership roles will be
equally balanced and
varied.
The rationale will be highly
detailed and well
organised, demonstrating
community, suitable for different
educational and contexts and/or a limited
therapeutic music attempt to relate
making; observations to the
student’s own experience.
Post-workshop evaluation
will reflect this standard
through an unacceptable
level of critical analysis
and/or self-awareness.
3. Reflect critically on The rationale and/or
workshop experiences evaluation will make
as observers, inadequate reference to
participants and material from relevant
leaders, placing these sources (e.g. research,
in the context of their literature or workshop
wider research. resources). Sources are
likely to have been too few
in number, irrelevant or
inappropriate for the
context. In the written work,
structural problems will
impede the flow and there
are likely to be numerous
inaccuracies and
inconsistencies in
referencing and in the
presentation of bibliographic
material.
strategies suitable for
different contexts and
there is an attempt to
relate observations to the
student’s own experience.
Post-workshop evaluation
will reflect this standard
through an acceptable
level of critical analysis,
though self-awareness
may be limited.
The rationale and/or
evaluation will make an
acceptable level of
reference to material from
relevant sources (e.g.
research, literature or
workshop resources).
The written work will adopt
an overall clear structure,
and some critical thought,
though it is likely that
some restructuring would
be beneficial. There will
be an attempt to be
accurate and consistent in
referencing and in the
presentation of
bibliographic material,
though this may not be
achieved completely
throughout.
4
knowledge of workshop excellent knowledge of
strategies suitable for a workshop strategies
range of different suitable for a wide range
contexts. Post-workshop of different contexts. Post-
evaluation will be workshop evaluation will
thorough with good use be thorough and
of critical analysis and thoughtful with meticulous
clear evidence of self- use of critical analysis and
awareness. an impressive level of self-
awareness and insight.
In the rationale and/or In the rationale and /or
evaluation, students will evaluation, students will
draw on a reasonably make detailed and
broad, range of relevant imaginative reference to
sources (e.g. research, research, literature and
literature and workshop workshop resources as
resources), in addition to necessary, whilst also
their own experiences, making strong and
demonstrating a convincing connections
considerable amount of with their own
critical thinking. The experiences. The written
written work will adopt work will adopt an
an effective structure excellent structure that
that conveys information conveys information in a
in a focused way, and most effective way.
referencing/ Referencing/presentation
presentation of of bibliographic material
bibliographic material will be consistently
with be mostly accurate accurate.
and consistent.
Over the past few months, I have had the opportunity to observe and live first hand the
power of music in the vulnerable populations: the young, elderly, sick and disabled people.
According to Stephen Malloch and Colwyn Trevarthen (2010), musicality is an innate
human ability that makes music production and appreciation possible- which means it is
naturally and equally present in every single human being- and it is what makes it possible
for people to share time meaningfully together in its emotional richness and structural
holding. This means that music is the best way of communication, especially when there
are weaknesses in other abilities, such as the lack of memory in people suffering dementia
or the difficulty in speech and speaking in people with Autism Spectrum Disorder, for
example.

After having witnessed the importance of music in these contexts and having learned how
to create music workshops in order to engage in the best possible way with children at
schools, elderly at care homes, sick at hospitals and disabled at special needs school; my
colleague Holly Greenwood-Rogers and I had to choose one of those settings in order to
create and deliver our own workshops. We decided to do the children’s workshop at the
Holland House Infant School and Nursery and the sick’s at the Royal Derby Hospital.

In order to plan our workshop at the school, we took into account three relevant elements
that we could observe on our visits to the CBSO family concerts –mostly directed to early
years and young people-: Imagination, Education and Interaction. To start we thought
about choosing a theme and develop the workshop revolving that theme, in this case, a
trip to an Island –which was an effective way of engaging with their imaginations-.

To welcome students into the hall and evoke the beach/island environment, we decided to
start the workshop playing “Under the Sea” from the Little Mermaid using our instruments
the French horn and the Cuatro, while the children were coming into the room. Although
they were too young to recognise the song (we delivered the workshop to two Nursery
groups aged 3 to 4 years old), we could tell from their enthusiasm that they were excited
about the activity that was about to start. After finishing this song and having captured their
attention, I started singing the “Say hello” song from the book “Music Express”, a call and
response song with the main purpose of making them interact by singing and greeting, we
also used this song to introduce ourselves by mentioning our names in the song:

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I sing: Say Hello I sing: Hello Holly
They respond: Hello They respond: Hello
I sing: Say Hello I sing: Hello Ivonne
They respond: Hello They respond: Hello

To invite them to sing the response I used my hands: pointing at me when I was singing
and pointing at them when it was their turn, Holly was also supporting their singing. This
was very effective and we got to make both of the groups sing very easy, creating our first
musical interaction with them.

To introduce our next activity we started talking about our desire to going on a holiday trip
to an island with blue skies, white sand, and sunny beaches. To help them imagine it we
printed an image of a very nice island with all of these characteristics and we showed it to
them while we invited and asked them if they would like to join us on our adventure trip. At
this point I would like to mention that we had not thought about having these images when
we were planning the workshop, but when we started rehearsing and bringing it to practice
we realised it was a better idea to play more with their imagination and we could notice
during the workshop delivery that they got really excited about “the trip” while watching the
image.

After this, Holly asked them which was the best way of going to the island, the children
started raising their hands in order to give their –very good and creative- answers: by boat,
speedboat, ferry, aquaplane, ship, sailing boat, among others. But in order to make them
think a bit more, I mentioned my ideas – which were not correct- such as car and train and
introduced the next activity: singing “We are going to the island, we are going to go by…”
with the melody of “Mary had a little lamb”. The first times we sang the lyrics with the
“wrong answers” in which cases they said “no” at the end of the song and finally they said
“yes” after we sang the “correct answer”: by boat.

With this activity, we were developing their understanding, which is part of the learning
area of “communication and language” according to 4Children (2015). As stated in their
booklet, children between 30 and 50 months old are able to understand questions such as
“What do we need to cut the bread?” and to know that a knife is needed, so a way of

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helping them develop this skill is making this kind of questions such as “what do we need
to pour your milk” or “How do we get to an island?”

After having decided that we needed to take a boat to get to the island, Holly and I put our
handmade sailor hats on to follow the storyline and keep playing with their imagination.
The next activity was the “sea-sickness” song, so I introduced it by saying that every time I
take a boat I feel sick because of its movement. For this activity I made them stand up and
follow the movements we put to the lyrics “up and down and round and round, wish my
feet were on the ground”.

Up: Stand on the toes.

And down: Bend over.
And round: Spin around.
Wish my feet were on the ground: Swaying from one foot to another.

According to the Early Years Foundation Stage in the UK, there are seven areas of
learning and development: communication and language, physical development, personal,
social and emotional development, literacy, mathematics, understanding the world and
expressive arts and design. Nicola Burke on her document “Musical Development Matters
in the Early Years” (2018) states that it is possible to observe how music interacts with all
of these areas. In the “Sea-Sickness” activity, for example, it can be said that we were
helping children developing their physical learning area by giving them the opportunity to
be active and improve their coordination and movement. Another learning area that was
being cultivated with this exercise was the Understanding of the World since they had to
relate the movements with the words, such as standing on their toes as going up and
bending over as going down.

While I was leading this activity, Holly put the French horn in parts around the hall in order
to move on to the next activity in which she was going to introduce it to the children. To
follow the narrative theme, Holly said she had lost her instrument in the boat and asked
them if they would help her find it. For this game, we printed an image of the French horn
so they could know what we were looking for. At this moment, the children started pointing
out the pieces that were throughout the hall, so we had to tell them that the only way to

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help Holly finding her instrument was by playing the “hot and cold” game with the clapping:
whenever Holly was getting closer to a part of the instrument they had to clap louder.

I would like to mention, that this game was a good idea to introduce dynamics, but I think
we could have played with them a little more, since Holly walked slow but straight to the
pieces of the horn, which made the clapping always go from quiet to loud, but never from
loud to quiet. It is something that we could have improved for the second workshop but we
only had around 15 minutes between each group and we did not realise it at that moment.

Holly was very didactic when she was putting the instrument together, she asked them
where they thought the bell and the mouthpiece should go. After having done this, she
asked if they knew what its name was, and finally, she introduced it as the French horn.
Before her performance playing the “Pirates of the Caribbean” main theme on the French
horn, we made the children try to describe its sound, with the main purpose of exploring
with their imagination and also creating expectations. The idea of this activity came out
from our observations to the CBSO family concerts where they introduced the instruments
of the orchestra, their sounds and the emotions they can evoke. As I mentioned before,
there must exist pedagogical purposes while doing these sort of workshops with early
years and it may be said that with this exercise we were developing their understanding of
the world – one of the learning areas of the Early Years Foundation Stage in the UK-.

The next activity consisted of singing “By the sea on the island” with the tune of “Old
McDonald”, in which the students had to think about things that they would see on the
island and produce a noise to represent it. I recall that we did the sound of the waves, for
example, by making “shhh” and the sound of the sand by tapping the hands with the floor.
According to Nicola Burke (2018), inviting the children this age (30 to 50 months old) to
create sound effects to accompany a story is a good way of developing their musical
abilities through exploration and playing, in addition it helps establishing positive
relationships.

After this activity, we had planned to sing a song called “We’re going to build the best
sandcastle”, but we realised we did not have enough time to do it, so we decided to move
on to the goodbye song of our workshop “Day O’, time to go home”. To introduce this song

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we said to the children we had had a very long and tiring day playing on the island and we
wanted to go back home – in order to bring the story to an end-.

Since this is a “call and response” song where the second verse is always repeated: “We
had fun but it’s time to go home”, we wanted the children to learn it and sing it, but at this
point of the workshop, they were already tired and their energy was low, so it was quite
difficult to make them sing this verse as we wished. Reflecting on this, I think we should
have ended the workshop just performing the song without trying to make them join us
with their voices.

At the end of each workshop, we received feedback from the teachers who assisted with
each group. Both of them agreed that it had been a good workshop in general terms, but
after the first group, the teacher told us to give more clear instructions to the children
because sometimes they did not know what to do.

Following her feedback, we tried to be more specific and straight with the instructions with
the second group and we asked them every time if it was clear what they had to do; this,
from my point of view, made the activities flow with more facility and permitted us to
engage more with the second group.

After the last group, the teacher said that it would have been better if we had made them
move and stand more, taking into account that they were very young and they had a lot of
energy. This was very good feedback and it made me think that we could have made them
clap, dance or make patterns with their bodies in certain songs. Certainly, this is feedback
that we are going to take into account in the future, in case we keep creating this kind of
music workshops with children.

The second setting we chose was the Royal Derby Hospital where we planned to have a
list of varied repertoire –from classical to popular and from slow/quiet to upbeat music- in
order to be able to engage with the patients and their relatives in accordance with their
mood. Our main purpose was to be able to connect with them through music and enable
them to feel calm and relax or happy and joyful in this scenario that can be very hard,
overwhelming and painful.

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As stated in an article published by the International Journal of Nursing Studies,
researches found positive impacts of music in terms of medical treatments, in patients
suffering from cancer, Parkinson, stroke and mental health issues –among others-
because it can calm and relax, enhance negative emotional feeling, reduce depression,
pain, blood pressure, and heart rates (Onosahwo Iyendo, 2016).

The repertoire that we prepared for this workshop was:

1. “Ave Maria” by Franz Schubert in our own arrangement for voice and French horn.
2. “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” from The Lion King in an arrangement for Cuatro and 2
voices.
3. “Hallelujah” by Leonard Cohen in an arrangement for Ukelele and 2 voices.
4. “Let’s call the whole thing off” by Ella Fitzgerald in an arrangement for Ukelele, 2
voices and egg shakers.
5. “Stand by Me” by Ben E. King in an arrangement for French horn, voice, and egg
shakers.

As can be seen, not only the repertoire we chose was varied but also the format for each
one of the songs, which permitted us to cover a wider range of moods. The “Ave Maria”
was our classical option, in case there were patients or relatives who enjoyed classical
music. We chose it because it is very renowned and it can also be relaxing and emotional.
“The Lion Sleeps Tonight” is a very famous song, so it would help us engage with any sort
of people and it evokes a happy mood. “Hallelujah” is a popular song as well, and it
evokes a calm mood, so we could use it to create relaxing and intimate atmospheres.
“Let’s call the whole thing off” is not a very renowned song, but the lyrics are entertaining
so we thought it would help us to lift people’s spirits. Finally, “Stand by me” is very famous
and it would easily permit us to engage with the listeners and create positive moods.

We visited the Royal Derby Hospital for two different days. The first time, we played in two
rooms and one corridor –which were connecting two other rooms- at the stroke rehab unit.
In the first room, there were two patients with their relatives, and we started playing “Let’s
call the whole thing off” since they were all awake and paying attention to us. After, I
decided to ask them if they would like to listen to some classical music such as the “Ave
Maria” – at this moment, another patient was brought into the room- and I started singing it

10
with a very delicate voice because I did not want to disturb the silence of the place. This
piece created a very nice and emotional environment but right in the middle of it, it
appeared that one of the patients started having problems to breath, and another one
started crying.

I must confess that this was a very hard moment to witness and I did not know If I should
stop the song or not, because I was not sure if it was appropriate to keep singing while one
of the patients was having a relapse, so I waited until the end of the phrase I was singing
to stop the performance. On the other hand, I found it hugely emotive –equally hard- to
see the other patient crying and I recalled Oliver Sack talking about the power of music
when he said: “one does not have to be especially musical to respond to music, to
recognise music, to react to music emotionally” (Knopfgroup, 2008); which reminds me
that music is what connects us as human beings at different levels, in more emotional and
profound ones.

After having lived this very impressive but important moment, we moved on to the next
room where there was just one man, we could not enter into his room so we had to play
from the door; he was awake and a nurse moved his bed so he could see us. Our view
was not very clear but we could see his legs and he was tapping his feet while we were
playing, we found this very motivating, since it was evident that he was struggling to move
– bearing in mind that many individuals who suffer a stroke are left with paralysis-. Apart
from this, we could also know that he was enjoying it because he told the nurse after we
finished our songs – “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” and “Stand by me”- he felt very grateful for
our playing.

Our third and final venue on that day was a corridor connecting two different rooms, the
idea was to play to the people in both rooms at the same time and to some patients that
were brought on their wheelchairs to the corridor – the ones who were feeling better, I
suppose-. We started this performance with “Let’s call the whole thing off” which is a funny
and upbeat song in order to capture their attention. After, we played “The Lion Sleeps
Tonight”, and I remember two of the women and some nurses, who were in front of us in
the corridor, were joining us with their singing –in a very shy and quiet way-, which was
very gratifying because it meant they were engaging with our performance. Before we
played the last song “Stand by Me”, I recall I said they should not feel shy to join us If they

11
knew the song, inviting them to sing loudly and attempting to create stronger bonding
between us. I think, having said that helped a little because they were singing with more
confidence, but it could have been better. We could have done more to make them join
while we were paying.

And that is exactly what Kate Fawcett wrote on the feedback sheet after having observed
us during this visit to the hospital: “Consider including more opportunities for participants to
get actively involved, simple percussion instruments can offer a fun alternative”. She
mentioned this because sometimes people do not feel confident enough for singing or
clapping along, and providing them some of these instruments could encourage them to
join in.

Having mentioned this, I remember that on our second visit to the hospital –where we
played at the stroke unit-, we performed to three men in the last room we went to. They
were all awake and seated –not in the beds-, which gave us the feeling that they were not
feeling that bad and they were in a good mood. So we decided to play “The Lion Sleeps
Tonight” which is a very renowned song and evokes positive feelings. One of the patients,
was very happy with our performance and clapped with excitement after we finished this
song, so I thought It would be a good idea to give him an egg shaker while we were
playing our last song “Stand by Me”, but I did not have the courage to do it because I felt
shy.

I personally think this is something I need to improve; I would like to feel more confident at
engaging to people in this kind of settings because playing at hospitals is certainly
something I would like to keep doing in the future. But I am also aware that it was not bad
at all –to be the first time- because we were able to connect with their emotions, distract
them from their realities –at least for a couple of minutes- and make them move.

On our second visit to the hospital, we played in three other rooms at the stroke unit. In the
first room we played for three women who were awake and in a good mood, so we started
with “Let’s call the whole thing off” and finished with “Stand by Me”. None of them joined us
but they were very pleased with our performance and they were clapping at the end of it.

12
The second room was quite particular, there were three patients as well but they were in a
sleepy mood, so we decided to start with “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” in a slower and quieter
version than always. During the time we were performing this song, one of the patients –
an elderly woman who was being fed by a nurse, right in front of us- fell asleep. This was
also a very special moment because it permitted us to perform the same music in a
different way, with a different mood and feeling; I felt like we were singing lullabies to them.
To end this very peaceful performance, we played “Hallelujah” by Leonard Cohen, which is
a very famous and calm song, and which sounded even more relaxing accompanied by
the Ukelele.

In the third room we visited there was just one man who could barely move his body, and
we were told by a nurse it would be a good idea to perform from one side – and not in front
of him- in order to try to make him move his head towards us. This patient had his eyes
closed, so we were not sure if he was listening or not, but when we started playing “The
Lion Sleeps Tonight” suddenly we noticed that his feet were moving under the blanket.
This fact made us feel hugely motivated to keep playing and try to make him move even
more, so we finished with “Stand by Me” which was one of the “upbeat” songs in our list.
However, we had to perform it differently, since he was resting and in a sleepy mood, so
we did not play it very loud. He kept tapping his feet throughout the performance and it
was very gratifying for us because it was evident that he was listening, enjoying and above
all, he was possibly giving good signs of recovery.

A recent study about the impact of music in stroke rehabilitation found that patients who
listened to self-selected music every day during the first two months of having suffered the
stroke, had better cognitive recovery – better verbal memory and focused attention- and
mood than patients who did not listen to music or listened to audiobooks instead (The
Lancet, 2008). So it is worth saying that music not only has the power to transform the
environment and mood of the patients in hospitals, it may actually, help them with their
recovery process.

From our last visit to the Royal Derby Hospital, Laura Waters wrote on the feedback sheet
that our music was well prepared and its choice was excellent and accurate with a wide
variety of sounds –referring to the different instrumentation-. She also mentioned that the
performance was polished, organised and fluid, and the attitude was positive and cheerful.

13
She pointed out the fact that we easily adapted to the environment by playing quietly at the
sleepy room. She commented that there was an attempt to engage because I was smiling,
making eye contact and moving with the music –swaying- but she also mentioned that it
would be good to develop engagement and including patients rather than performing to
them –just as Kate Fawcett said on our first feedback-.

After having planned and delivered both workshops I can say that although they both were
musical workshops –you will forgive the repetition-, we had to deal with them in such
different ways, taking into account that they both had different purposes, they were
addressed to different populations and they were delivered in two very contrasting venues.

The children’s workshop had to be planned and delivered with more detail and precision,
since we had to think about a theme and a story to tell, and according to that we had to
create the activities and put them all together in a specific order. While planning the
hospital’s one was more related to thinking about the possible situations and moods we
might found and according to that, creating a list of repertoire that we could perform in any
order.

Planning the activities for the children were mostly thought from the pedagogy –we wanted
them to learn songs and play with dynamics for example- and the development of certain
abilities –such as motor, speech skills and understanding the world-, while the main
purpose of us bringing music to hospitals was to bring joy and/ or relaxation to the people
and their families, considering that hospitals –and people being sick- can be very stressful
and hard environments.

Delivering workshops to children had to do with taking control of every activity, being clear
with the instructions and having specific expectations about what we wanted from them –
the children-; either making them sing, move or answer to our questions. While delivering
workshops to the people at the hospital was more about being open and sensitive to the
environment of each room in order to respond in the best possible way with music. Playing
at hospitals meant also not having clear expectations about people’s reactions to our
performance, because literally anything could happen. They may cry, get annoyed, feel
happy, sing along or react in any possible way on this kind of setting.

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Even though both workshops were extremely different and had contrasting purposes, they
had one thing in common: music. And that is what I, personally, found more interesting
about this whole experience: music can be used in any kind of setting and to any kind of
purpose. It is extremely adaptable and that is the reason why I consider it as one of the
most powerful tools that we –human beings- have to transform lives and societies. It can
be a pedagogic tool with children, but it can also be a healing tool with the sick. It can be a
way of communication between people and a way of exploring our deepest feelings and
memories. It can be used to bring back identities and also to develop other human learning
areas and skills. But it can also be a tool that connect us and permit us to share
meaningfully time together -without ignoring its amazing and quite obvious entertaining
feature-.

Finally, I think it is worth pointing out at this moment that all of the above is only possible
because we are musical beings. As it is mentioned at the beginning of this essay;
musicality is intrinsic in the human being, it exists in everybody to the same extent, which
makes each one of us equally able to create it, perceive it or react to it - reason why it is a
universal language-. And I believe that it is our responsibility as human beings to keep
using it as a tool for our own benefit.

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Burke, N (2018). “Musical Development Matters in the Early Years”. Available at:
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education.org.uk/sites/default/files/Musical%20Development%20Matters%20ONLINE.pdf
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Knopfgroup, 2008. Oliver Sacks - Musicophilia - Alzheimer's/The Power of Music. [online

video] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdYplKQ4JBc [Accessed 26 April
2019].

Malloch, S. and Trevarthen, C. (2010) “Musicality: Communicating the vitality and

interests of life” in Communicative musicality : exploring the basis of human
companionship. Oxford University Press.

Onosahwo Iyendo, T (2016) " Exploring the effect of sound and music on health in hospital
settings: A narrative review", International Journal of Nursing Studies, volume 63, pp. 82-
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[Accessed 24 April 2019].

The Lancet, 2008. Music in stroke rehabilitation . Elsevier. Available at: https://www-
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