About Nordoff and Robbins

Photograph: Clive Robbins

Paul Nordoff and Clive Robbins were two music therapy pioneers working between 1958 and 1977. Their work combined Nordoff’s experience as composer and concert pianist with Robbins’ experience in special education. The focus was on children with special needs, and through their work and research provided strong evidence to support the efficacy of music therapy as an intervention to help children relate and communicate more effectively.

Paul Nordoff was an American composer, concert pianist, university lecturer, and recipient of two fellowships to the Juilliard School of Music, one for piano and the other for composition. In 1933 he won the Bearns Prize for a piano concerto and was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship. A second Guggenheim followed in 1935, and in 1940 he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for his piano quintet.

Clive Robbins was working in special education at Sunfield Children's Home in England when he met Paul. Clive had a burning interest and belief in the arts as a way to engage the special children with whom he worked. They first developed their approach for practical clinical purposes while working together with the children at Sunfield Children's Home in 1959.

Although Nordoff and Robbins were of different nationalities, generations, and educational and musical backgrounds, several common elements between them contributed to their successful collaboration. These included their similar philosophical background in anthroposophy, the supportive environment of Sunfield Children's Home and the guidance of Herbert Geuter, M.D, director of research at Sunfield.

During seventeen years of pioneering work as therapists, tape recordings and comprehensive notes of all their individual sessions were kept. The resulting research formed the basis for the training course they developed in London in 1975, and the three books they wrote on the subject.

The Nordoff-Robbins organisation has centres throughout the world and has been involved in clinical practice and research in music therapy since 1959 and providing training courses since 1974.

For a detailed history of the work of Nordoff and Robbins please go to:

  Link:www.nyu.edu/education/music/nrobbins