Hearing – Feeling – Playing

Music and Movement with Hard-of-Hearing and Deaf Children

By Shirley Salmon. Foreword by Dame Evelyn Glennie

Book cover: Hearing – Feeling – Playing

(Paperback) (Published)

(February 2009)

ISBN: 9783895006210

Price: $38.00

Out of stock

(PDF) (Published)

(January 2008)

ISBN: 9783752001617

Price: $32.00

The theme of this book is presented in chapters covering basic principles in theory and practice. Three individuals with a hearing impairment report on their development, experience and personal approaches to music. These are followed by chapters on developmental topics, an overview of music in education and therapy, and insight into recent research on music perception. Different educational and therapeutic approaches using music and/or movement relevant to different age groups are described and extended in reports on music and movement with various groups – from preschool children and family projects, to school children and teenagers.


The theme of this book is presented in chapters covering basic principles in theory and practice. Three individuals with a hearing impairment report on their development, experience and personal approaches to music. These are followed by chapters on developmental topics, an overview of music in education and therapy, and insight into recent research on music perception. Different educational and therapeutic approaches using music and/or movement relevant to different age groups are described and extended in reports on music and movement with various groups – from preschool children and family projects, to school children and teenagers.

  • Edited by Shirley Salmon

“Overall “Hearing - Feeling - Playing” is a welcome addition and will provide music teachers with new strategies for the inclusion of students with hearing loss in music.”<br/><br/>Kim McCord<br/><br/>In: Music Educators Journal. 97 (2011) 4. pp. 22.<br/><br/>----------------------------------<br/><br/>“This wonderful book, with a foreword by Dame Evelyn Glennie is an addition to literature that considers the relationship of music and people who engage in it with the sense of hearing developed in a different way. (...)<br/><br/>This is a book that is rich with detail and practical suggestion but that also captures the heart and soul and emotion that are fundamental to different ways of hearing. It is highly recommended.”<br/><br/>Anne Power<br/><br/>In: Musicworks. Journal of the Australian Council of Orff Schulwerk. Volume 15 No. 1, 2010.<br/><br/>----------------------------------<br/><br/>“The purpose of this book of short essays is to introduce readers to practical approaches to music and movement with children affected by varying degrees of hearing loss, and some other conditions, supported by an outline of the theoretical principles underlining these approaches. It opens with the personal histories of three deaf musician-teachers, and closes with a series of reports of successful practice in a variety of environments with children of different ages. The Foreword is provided by the ever-generous Dame Evelyn Glennie. Teachers of children with special needs, music and speech/language therapists are likely to form the most appreciative audience for the book, but there is also much on offer for readers outside these professions, including students, parents, dancers and musicians. Originally published in German, the contributions of the 17 authors from<br/>Austria, Denmark, Germany and Italy have been translated into English for this edition, which also includes five chapters by English-speaking writers. (...)<br/><br/>I have just used the word “working” but what comes over to the reader in chapter after chapter - and perhaps this is one of the most successful aspects of the book - is each author’s commitment to “playful”communication through music and movement, and the ways in which this can best be facilitated so as to enable every individual, whatever their situation, to fulfil their potential for self-expression. While the achievements of deaf and hearing-impaired musicians and educators such as Glennie, Wilberg, Bartlmä and Whittaker may be seen as exceptional, as well as extraordinary, they also provide inspiration: with appropriate guidance - such as that outlined in this collection - many more young people may come to enjoy participation in musical and particularly social activity.”<br/><br/><br/>Jane Ginsborg<br/><br/>In: The British Journal of Music Education. Vol. 28 (2011) 1. pp. 108-111.