Proceedings, Oxford, UK (2002) - World Federation of Music Therapy

esponded by taking my hand and moving my fingers into the same
position as his, so that I should copy him exactly. Each time I tried to
vary my response, Mark either moved my hand or he became disengaged
altogether.
Our whole interaction seemed to become reduced down to Mark tickling
the drum with one finger and then wanting me to do the very same thing.
What had initially seemed like the start of an exchange between two
people turned out to be something rather rigid. I felt that I was playing no
part in the interaction: my mind was excluded; this was a game just for
my finger.
This interaction with Mark was reminiscent of work I had done with
another child, Joshua, who had engaged in similarly strictly imitative
interactions when I had begun working with him two years earlier.
Joshua had Fragile X Syndrome, and was four years old when he started
music therapy. During the sessions, Joshua would bang the drum with a
drumstick and would be desperate for me to do the same, sometimes
urging me on to copy him, saying ‘do it, do it’. We could engage in long
interactions if I imitated him exactly, including playing the same
instrument as him, but if I responded more freely or on a different
instrument, Joshua could not engage. It seemed as if without an exact
imitation he was unable to interact at all, and our connection would seem
to fall apart. The boundary between what Joshua felt was him and what
was me seemed at times to be similarly fragile. For example, sometimes
Joshua would appear to issue instructions, such as pointing to an
instrument, but it was unclear whether he was telling me what to do or
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