ABSTRACT
We are educators with a background in human biology, medicine and music, and when giving presentations on injury prevention in musicians we are sometimes asked whether performance arts medicine really deserves a role in the formal education of music students. This is not an entirely unexpected question given that performing arts medicine is a relatively new branch of occupational health. Only a small proportion of clinicians and other health professionals are currently aware of it and even fewer have received training in this field. Within the crowded curriculum of music schools and conservatoires, it must compete with traditional subjects that are central to the understanding and performance of music. In this chapter, we hope to demonstrate that formal instruction in issues relating to the health and well-being of music students is not only sufficiently important to merit inclusion in the musical curriculum, but actually a means of enhancing performance. We will justify this position by revealing the extent of performance related health problems among musicians in general and music students in Higher Education in particular. The studies we cite demonstrate the consequences of being in an intensely competitive musical environment in which psychological pressures and long hours of practise combine to affect the health of future performers and in some cases limit their ability to achieve their professional goals. But what is to be done about this? Setting up courses on musicians’ health and well-being may appear daunting for educational institutions that have no previous expertise in this rather specialised area. By reviewing a number of existing courses we will demonstrate a range of approaches and examples of good practice that will help music educators devise programmes appropriate to their institutions.
