The Interview Series focuses on four differing views of the proposed EMTR, from both inside and outside the profession, as well as giving a national and international overview. In addition to actively assisting the development of a psychotherapy service in Northern Ireland, Lord Alderdice has been a supporter of the arts therapies for many years, and brings an informed outsider's view of our profession. His experiences as the post-Good Friday Agreement Speaker of the N. Irish Assembly and his current work within the House of Lords provide a valuable perspective for our profession. Jos De Backer is well-known as a presenter and author, and brings both an international view as President of the EMTC, as well as from within the profession in his twin roles of clinician and training programme head. From the UK profession, Alison Barrington and Nuala Murray offer respectively a national and regional view of what a Europe-wide registration scheme might mean. Alison's recent PhD examined professional issues and this combined with her role as clinical, teacher, and member of the APMT Executive offers a unique stance; Nuala's clinical experience reflects her role in the pioneering work undertaken within Northern Ireland, where contracts have always been related to setting up new services in areas where there has been no music therapy previously. These four interviewees offer contrasting responses to the concept of the European Music Therapist Register, against which the readership can add their own thoughts.

This paper reports on a collaborative research project, conducted at the Nordoff-Robbins Music Therapy Centre, London, which investigated parental involvement (including therapist-parent interactions) in their children's music therapy. It observes a tension between therapists' dual concerns on the one hand to preserve confidentiality and on the other to inform and support parents in relation to their child's music therapy. It suggest a reformulation of confidentiality based on the development of relationships founded on trust and the supported exercise of informed judgement. The collaborative research process, although unusual in music therapy, is considered to have much to offer.

There seems to be a growing interest in both music therapy with families and short-term therapy, and a body of music therapy literature relating to these areas. Within the context of waiting list targets in the NHS, therapists are increasingly experiencing a demand for short-term, effective interventions that are easily accessible for families and individuals. This paper describes a way of working that has developed through clinical work at Tanglewood, the Children's Day Resource at Leicestershire Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS) and focuses on the use of music therapy as a short-term intervention that has developed with individuals and families. Case studies will be used to illustrate a model of short-term work and some relevant literature will also be discussed.

Vulnerability to crisis in newly arrived refugee youth is common as they try to come to terms with past traumatic experiences and acculturate to the new country in which they have settled. This study examined the effects of a short-term music therapy program on the changes to the Behaviour Symptom Index (BSI, Reynolds and Kamphus, 1998) of 31 new refugee youths attending an English language reception centre in Brisbane. A cross-over design with two five-week intervention periods was employed with group music therapy sessions conducted one-two times per week. Results indicate that changes to BSI scores approached significance indicating trends that music therapy affected a positive change on generalised behaviour. Findings are discussed with reference to stabilising and preventing crises with this population.

This paper presents a systematic review of published research investigating therapeutic applications of music in cancer patients. The review focuses on published international research from the USA, Canada, Australia and European countries using four electronic databases: PSYCHINFO, WEB OF SCIENCE, MEDLINE and SCIENCEDIRECT. Twenty four papers were identified and each paper was coded in terms of sample type, basic research question, research design and methodological details, results and implications for future research. Utilising previous work such as Aldridge (2003) as a point of departure, this review provides information on the key areas of interest in the psychology of music therapy and the therapeutic use of music amongst cancer patients and gives an account of the methodological approaches that were adopted. Results provide an overview of reported outcomes of music interventions such as reduction in anxiety, reduction in side effects of chemotherapy, physiological effects, behavioural improvements and communication and expression improvements.