|
|
|
|
Newsletter 3/2002
Gurdjieff music used for music therapy
"The Piano Music of Gurdjieff and De Hartmann as a
stimulus for improvisation in the musical therapy based on
the Nordhoff-Robbins approach"
This is the title of Eva Capella's thesis with which she concluded
her studies at the 'Institute for Musical Therapy', Department
of Medicine of the University of Witten / Herdecke, Germany.
Her studies were supervised by Prof. Dr. D. Aldridge.
Reading Eva's 100-page book dealing with the abovementioned
subject left me deeply impressed with the quality of her work.
Paul Nordhoff's improvisational framework has a relevance reaching
far beyond the borders of musical therapy. For instance, his
models are equally valuable for everyone attempting to improvise
in whatever environment, such as classroom full of children,
or even a Movements class!
The work done in this thesis to analyse Gurdjieff's and De Hartmann's
musical works, based on Nordhoff's models for improvisation,
guiding the reader along countless practical examples, has to
be qualified as no less than unique and exemplary. The second
part of her thesis, written with equal thoroughness, deals with
a comparative analysis of the best-known oriental maqams and
the scales used by Gurdjieff and De Hartmann.
I think that we, i.e. the many musicians active in the Gurdjieff
Work, should be ashamed of ourselves for not having the vision
and professionalism to produce a work of this scope and magnitude.
Although Eva has guaranteed us the availability of her thesis
to all those interested in the subject, the main problem now
is that it is written in German. Even so, we recommend all those
who are seriously interested to contact us, so that we can see
what measures can be taken to translate this thesis, or part
of it, in English.
Wim van Dullemen
 |
|  2/3 |
|
|
