Berklee Blogs: A Vision for Music Therapy in Ghana

In January 2016, the nonprofit MusicXchange, founded by Berklee student Federico Masetti, organized a two-week service trip to Ghana to build strategic partnerships and raise awareness about the organization. The following post was written by Ellie Foster, one of the trip’s participants.

Among the many meetings we had in Kumasi, Ghana, on January 7, none was quite so preliminarily daunting–and ultimately fruitful–as our appointment with Dr. Baffour Awuah. Dr. Awuah, medical director of Komfo Anyoke Teaching Hospital, sits on the board of HopeXChange Medical Center and agreed to meet with us at the request of fellow board member Riccardo Masetti—noted oncologist and father of our trip's leader, Federico. As we sat in his waiting room, I couldn’t help but feel nervous about pitching the concept of music therapy to him.

I had sent him a proposal for a pilot program at HopeXChange Medical Center and hoped that perhaps he’d had a chance to skim it. But what if he hadn’t? What if I was giving a cold call? How could I relay the tremendous amount of research that supports medical music therapy in a matter of minutes? How could I translate my meaningful clinical experiences into something applicable to his hospital? How could I make sure my palms weren’t so sweaty that I would offend him when I shook his hand?!

When we were finally invited into his office, Dr. Awuah put me at ease with his warm welcome. (At least, at ease enough so that by the time he shook my hand I didn’t slime him.) Not only was Dr. Awuah inviting, but he had also read the entirety of my proposal and was ready with questions and had developed a vision for music therapy in Ghana far more comprehensive than we had previously considered...

Read the full post on Berklee Blogs.

Ellie Foster studied music therapy at Berklee, and is a proud member of the MusicXChange team. She is currently completing her music therapy internship at Boston Children’s Hospital.