I recently discovered through a musician friend, Judy Gerratt, this amazing Venezuelan man, named Jose Abreu. He has developed a system of teaching music to young children and created youth orchestras throughout his country. In this video on the TED site, he describes why and how music is having a transformational effect on Venezuelan children.

Here is a quote from near the end of his speech:

“The huge spiritual world that music produces, which also lies within itself, is the end of overcoming material poverty. The minute a child plays, he is no longer poor. The historian, Arnold Toynbee, said that the world is suffering a huge spiritual crisis…I believe that to confront such crisis, only art and religion can give proper answers to humanity, to mankind’s deepest aspirations and the historic demands of our time.”

It is precisely because he goes to the heart of music—to its spiritual essence—that he is able to catalyze individual and social change. His reflections on the transformational power of music mirror what I’m observing in my work with women with developmental disabilities. (see video) I would state in this way the part of his quote I italicized: ”The minute a person plays, she/he is no longer disabled.”