Music in Medicine

SIDNEY LICHT, M.D.
Fellow, New York Academy of Medicine
NEW ENGLAND CONSERVATORY OF MUSIC BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS
Copyright, 1946, By
SIDNEY LICHT, M.D.
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form.
First Edition
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
In presenting a musician’s point of view on so specific a subject as “Music in Medicine”, it seems to me necessary at the outset to clarify the status of music as an independent aesthetic art, and its practical adaptation for definite utilitarian purposes. We must clearly separate the active individual process of artistic creation from the elements of passive perception and from effects such perception may have when applied for different realistic reasons.
Taken aesthetically, as an art, music is a social “superstructure”, which, as far as the individual creative act is concerned, remains an abstract manifestation of the human mind and imagination. Its existence as a creative art is possible only as long as the practical “possibilities” and potentialities of its effects in the phase of passive perception, do not intrude into and interfere with its character as an absolute non-utilitarian phenomenon in the processes of the creative art. Art, by its very nature is a product of individuality. As opposed to the anonymous craft, the main requirement of an aesthetically artistic product assuming the presence of professional skill and knowledge is that it be the work of a human organism, which possesses acceptable qualifications of vocation and expression. To this attribute we have given such names as talent, genius, imagination, and many others. This phenomenon of specific predestination must also be accompanied by a characteristic property which has received such names as personality, individuality or originality. It is obvious that these fundamentals of artistic creation prevent any general or universal approach to the creative processes which, with the exception of purely technical and formal elements of craftsmanship and common expression of specific style, exclude the pattern and definite utilitarian aims. All these factors are obviously concerned only with the living moment of the musical art in the essence and genesis of the individual creation.