A new study, led by University of California – Riverside (UCR) doctoral ethnomusicology student Owain J. Graham and published in Anthropology of Consciousness, has investigated the crucial role of traditional music during psychedelic ceremonies.
Traditional Peruvian songs, called “icaros”, are played during ayahuasca healing ceremonies in the region. At the Takiwasi Center for Drug Addiction Rehabilitation and Research on Traditional Medicines in Tarapoto, Perú, these icaros, in combination with ayahuasca and psychotherapy, form part of the treatment process for men rehabilitating from drug and alcohol addictions.
Whilst ayahuasca has been gaining increasing attention as a potential treatment for mental health conditions, in the upper Peruvian Amazon region, this has been an ancient cultural practice, Graham said.
The combination of monitored psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy at the Takiwasi Center — along with icaros sung in Spanish, Quechua, other Amazonian Indigenous languages, and sometimes French — are used to help men shift away from drugs.
“I got to thinking, ‘Maybe I can add something to this conversation. Maybe I can help add some context and hopefully amplify the perspectives of traditional healers using these medicines/substances.’ The healers inherited practices going back hundreds of years to their ancestors,” stated Graham.
Through his research, Graham has said he has understood that illnesses are not just physical ailments, but also derive from social and spiritual issues.
The findings
About 67% of participants who completed a nine-to-12-month programme at Takiwasi Center, did not return to substance abuse, according to previous research cited by Graham and his colleagues.
About 86% of patients showed statistically significant improvements on the Addictions Severity Index, an assessment tool used to evaluate substance abuse treatment.
An analysis from 2017-19 assessed 180 responses, finding that all patients reported that icaros changed their psycho-emotional state.
It also found that icaros effected healing related to “unblocking,” a process also known as “cleansing” and “removing,” referring to reports of ayahuasca’s purgative effects, both physical and psycho-emotional.
Graham, whose research interests include indigeneity and ritual music in South America, stated: “Ethnomusicologists and medical anthropologists understand the role that music plays in healing among many cultures.
“While Western biomedicine’s foundation in science is strong, it has also neglected to explain the connection of mind-body and how music can effect healing.”
Treating addiction in men
The Takiwasi Center states that it only hosts men in its on-site residential programme because in Perú and around the world most substance addicts are men.
Respecting the guidance of Amazonian healers, the programme also requires complete focus, including sexual abstinence, which is why it does not allow women to live within the community of rehabilitation patients. However, women do receive treatment and are allowed to participate in the center’s healing ceremonies.
Patients at the Takiwasi Center partake in six-hour ayahuasca ceremonies guided by traditional healers. The healers guide participants with icaros, the music emotionally and mentally transitioning them from one stage to another.
Responses and experiences did not vary when it came to a participant’s culture and demographic background. Graham’s sample included 58% South American and 42% Western European men.
However, Graham warns against literal interpretations and unrealistic expectations. Traditional healing takes time, which is why Takiwasi’s program is nine to 12 months long. Also, during this period participants have time to integrate lessons and process the trauma that is brought up by ayahuasca ceremonies, Graham said.
“I would caution people in both directions. A lot of people have been hearing more about ayahuasca in the past 10 to 15 years. Some claim they were reborn, with some major trauma healed after one ayahuasca session. That can happen, but that is not the normal case,” Graham said.
Graham said the topic of his research needs to be further explored and the role of music as a therapeutic tool better understood so that music can be more effectively integrated in healing treatment options for patients in the United States, and potentially globally, suffering from addictions and other illnesses.
He added: “What’s important to note is that there needs to be more collaboration between researchers across disciplinary lines. Clinical researchers should be thinking of more traditional uses as they create therapies in hospital-type environments.”
