Biography
Born and raised in New York (the daughter of a green-grocer and what was then called a 'stay-at-home' Mom), Concetta Tomaino made her connection to music early, adopting the trumpet as her instrument of choice (as it remains to this day, though it is joined by the piano and accordion, her main choice for therapy). The first girl in her family to attend college, Concetta enrolled at Long Island’s Stony Brook University in 1972 as a biology major, but, by her junior year, a continuing passion for music moved her to change her major to music.
Forming a synaptic-like connection between music and medicine, Concetta turned her energies to music therapy, creating independent study courses because there was no music therapy program at Stony Brook. Concetta Tomaino graduated from Stony Brook University in 1976 with a Bachelor of Arts in Music Performance and minors in psychology and sciences and an abiding interest in the emerging field of music therapy.
By 1980, Concetta Tomaino had joined Beth Abraham as the only music therapist (then part of the facilities department of recreation) and began to notice patients in the dementia unit responding positively and in some cases with remarkable speed, to music. She delved deeper into the neurological underpinnings as it became clear that music therapy had more to offer patients than a mere diversion from their everyday existence.
It was at Beth Abraham in 1980 that she became acquainted with the eminent and acclaimed visiting neurologist in long-term care, Dr. Oliver Sacks. The author of a breakthrough book called “Awakenings” (later made into a movie starring Robert De Niro and Robin Williams), Tomaino found a valuable ally in Dr. Sacks when it came to championing the benefits of music therapy. Indeed, in his newest book “Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain” (Knopf, 2007) Dr. Sacks recounts case-examples of their long collaboration, adding that Connie Tomaino "has been my co-worker and adviser in all matters musical for more than twenty-five years."
In addition to her contributions with Dr. Sacks (including his 1995 volume An Anthropologist on Mars), Dr. Tomaino’s work has been featured in such other books as A Matter of Dignity by Andrew Potok, The Mozart Effect by Don Campbell, Sounds of Healing by Mitchell Gaynor, M.D. and Age Protectors (Rodale Press) and covered by television programs and networks as the BBC and such CBS News’ staples as 60 Minutes and 48 Hours.
Concetta Tomaino earned a Masters and Doctor of Arts in Music Therapy from New York University in 1998.
Read more about this topic: Concetta M. Tomaino
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