Discuss Traditional and Cultural Music

I currently work in a predominately white community, with some individuals in a rural setting. The traditional songs range from classic lullabies such as Twinkle Twinkle to You are My Sunshine. Many parents of the children I see listen to Country Music and Classic Rock.

I am in a fairly rural community. Lullabies, and traditional children’s songs are popular here for kids, and country music is popular with adults in this area. Culturally, many people in my community are of Irish and Scandinavian decent and those traditional songs are popular as well.

I go to many different sites all located in or near Portland, and I feel like each site has its own culture and traditions when it comes to music. One site I go to is a Jewish community for elder, and they have strong connections with their religious music as well as knowing many of the popular and musical theater songs from the 1940s/1950s. Many homes I go to use music in an upbeat way and connect with classic rock. I also work with a family of Argentinean Americans and they have taught me a lot about Argentinean and Latin American musicians, as well as progressive rock. Portland itself has a pretty eclectic music scene so it makes sense that we all have our personal music cultures.

I’ve worked with elders in a Black neighborhood community center where traditional gospel, jazz, and southern American roots music is common. With my clients in downtown Portland who have experienced houselessness, there are a lot of requests for classic rock music of the 60s through the 80s. I have had clients from China and Taiwan and was introduced to the music of artists such as Teresa Teng as well as folk music in Mandarin and Cantonese. One client often would sing Chinese folk songs in solfège. There are a lot of Latinx clients from many different countries who like mariachi, ranchera, banda, cumbia, and Spanish Catholic hymns. Eastern European clients have shared lots of traditional folk and classical music from their countries of origin. I had a dementia client from Sri Lanka who played really intricate Tamil drum rhythms. Have had many clients who love music from The Great American Songbook & former classical musicians who can/could really deep dive into the Western classical music canon. For traditional American folk music I turn to Pete Seeger, Sweet Honey In the Rock, and other artists who sought/seek to keep traditional music alive.

I recently I found a couple of apps for seeking out traditional music online beyond YouTube and Spotify. The Radiooooo app (you can search by country and decade), and the Radio Garden app which searches music stations from around the globe, some playing cultural and traditional music, and there’s also a very useful website called decolonizingthemusicroom.com which has some useful discussion on using music if it is not from your culture of origin, specifically indigenous peoples music.

Thank you all for sharing about your communities. I always enjoy hearing about all the different communities music therapists are working with and the music within those cultures.

I work within a community with a large Native Alaskan population. Cultural traditions are very important and highly valued within this community and songs/chants are passed down that tell stories about the world, spirits, and their values. I have just started practicing within this community within the last 6 months or so and am looking forward to building my practice and becoming more familiar with these traditions along the way. Juneau is a very artistic and musical community in general and we have a wide variety of interests here form strong folk music traditions that are displayed in a huge festival each spring to rock, jazz, classical, and everything in between!

The traditional and cultural music in the community where I work is unable to be summarized easily. I work in a NYC hospital with global outreach, and as such, have children and families traveling from all over the world to receive care with us. Approximately half of our patient population speaks a primary language other than English at home – the largest percentages speak Spanish, Mandarin (and other Chinese dialects), Arabic, Hindi (and other Indian dialects/languages), Hebrew, and Yiddish. All types of music, performers, and traditions can be found here. Neighborhoods that I travel through to get from work -> home include Koreatown, Little Italy, Chinatown, Little Poland, Curry Hill, and Little Haiti. While I don’t walk to work, the varied musical traditions of these neighborhoods are visible (and audible) within the subway stations of said neighborhoods, as there are often street performers playing on the platform while people are waiting for the train.