Music Makes the World go Round. At least that’s what the song says. Music is also therapy. Enter Music Therapy Gateway in Communications (MTGIC). Founder, Dr Martha Summa Chadwick, is uniquely qualified to direct this organization, having enjoyed successful careers as a concert pianist, teacher, and Information Technologist. Yes, that’s right, IT. She is a great advocate of music therapy and partners with certified music therapists whenever possible even though she is not a certified music therapist herself. So what is she doing?
Notes to blocks is a project utilizing technology to better bring music creation to persons affected with Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, stroke, autism, or even neuro-typical individuals. How? Well, the Chattanooga Public Library already has electronic piano keyboards thanks to UTC. MTGIC painstakingly created hand drawn blocks like the ones in the grant image, but in order to make a more robust and customizable collection of songs we needed technology. Enter Riley Shipley. He is currently in his final semester of attaining a Master’s Degree in Computer Science at UTC and has agreed to develop the computer program that will automate the color-coded graphs using an xml file input.
Our $3,000 grant goes primarily to fund the computer development effort, then purchase a license for Logic Pro software/app along with a dedicated keyboard for creation of the xml files, and create a budget for the library to purchase scores and potentially print hundreds of color pages. Lee Dorsey Hope has agreed to be the library’s main point of contact for the project and will lead the effort there. Thanks, Lee!