Content area
Full text
Dr. Akombo is interviewed by editor Kevin Kirkland on the practices combining music and health in Kenya, on the concept of ethnomusic therapy, and on the various social roles of music in African cultures.
Le Dr. Akombo est interviewé par l'éditeur Kevin Kirkland sur les pratiques reliant musique et santé au Kenya, sur le concept d'ethnomusicothérapie et sur les divers rôles sociaux de la musique dans les cultures africaines.
David Otieno Akombo (Ph.D., University of Florida, 2006). Intrigued by the peculiarities of medical and psychological practices of music and the arts in healing, Dr. Akombo has studied and researched the healing power of music as both scholar and performer. Music educator, ethnomusicologist, musician, composer and drummer, he has worked predominantly in Africa and Southeast Asia and has studied with Balinese artists. His book, Music and Healing Across Cultures (Ames, Iowa: Culicidae Press, 2006) unfolds the mechanics of the relationships among music, healing, and the cosmos. It shows the organizing power of this tradition in its ability to promote mind/body coordination in people with schizophrenia. Dr. Akombo's second book Music and Medicine: Connections Found has recently been published (Seaburn Press, 2009). He is a contributing author to Contemporary Voices in Music Therapy (Eds. Stige, Brynjulf & Carolyn Kenny; Oslo: Unipub Press, 2002). Dr. Akombo is Diversity Fellow and Assistant Professor of Music Education at Weber State University in the USA.
What has drawn you to study the therapeutic values of music?
As I grew up in a little village in Kenya, little did I know that I would develop an interest in the power of music in human life. I enjoyed singing in school productions and in my church choir. While in Kenya, I saw children suffering in refugee camps...