Supriya Crocker is an accredited music therapist in Victoria, B.C.
She started her love of music-making at the early age of 7, when her mother enrolled her in piano lessons. After many years of practise and performing, she joined various bands and also began teaching music. It was when she had a music student with multiple sclerosis, that she saw growth that stretched beyond learning to sing a melody or play a song. “What can music do?”. Supriya saw how musical activities were increasing her student’s lung capacity, building her vocal cord resilience, and decreasing her pain perception.
Watch Globe and Mail Video: Supriya shares about using music therapy for clients with brain injuries.
Around the same time, she was in a band where the bass player was a music therapist. Supriya’s interest in music therapy was formed; she wanted to know how to purposefully use music to help enhance learning, restore health, and amplify life.
Fast forward through an education in both music therapy and biology, playing in bands, teaching music, working for an airline for 10 years, moving from the prairies to the B.C. coast, and raising a family…she now practices music therapy in Victoria, B.C. As a scientist and a musician, she brings a unique perspective to her work. She values how music is applied to reach many types of non-musical goals:
Helping a child with autism to recognize/comprehend facial expressions by matching them to musical sounds…Working with a woman with Alzheimers to record her life’s legacy in song-writing…Supporting a young woman with traumato express her feelings through singing.
Supriya specializes in: children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD), Alzheimers and dementias, Speech/language Disorders, reduction of anxiety, pain management, Life Processing, traumatic brain injuries (TBI) and physical, cognitive and/or behavioural disorders.
Supriya completed a Bachelor of Music Therapy from the Capilano University and a Bachelor of Biological Sciences (Psychology Minor) from the University of Calgary.
When not working as a music therapist, or chasing after her two young daughters, Supriya likes to think she could be found enjoying a locally roasted cup of coffee with a friend, digging through her vegetable garden, or relishing a homemade beef and okra curry.
Supriya Crocker is an accredited music therapist in Victoria, B.C.