Clara Takarabe

One avenue Dr. Bonakdarpour studies for treating these patients is how music can help with their brain's processing problems.

He created the Northwestern Music and Medicine program with violist and music practitioner Clara Takarabe.

The program studies how music can be used for therapeutic treatment.

Together, they developed clinically designed improvisatory music, or its catchier name, restorative music.

So that was very inspiring and it was really, really, you know, coming out of the culture right in front of your house, you know?

And restorative music made its way out of clinical settings.

Clara Takarabe took this method to communities stricken by grief, gun violence, or burnout in an effort to bring the therapeutic power of what she and Dr. Bonakdarpour had developed to people who needed calming music.

And music therapy works in the other direction, too.