Paul Madaule
// Author, Listening Therapist & LecturerPAUL MADAULE is an author, Listening Therapist, lecturer, workshop leader, and Director of The Listening Centre in Toronto, Ontario. He studied and worked with internationally-known otolaryngologist Dr. Alfred Tomatis for more than a decade before developing a dozen Tomatis Method Centres throughout Canada, Mexico, and the United States. His book When Listening Comes Alive: A Guide To Effective Learning And Communication was originally published in 1994. An updated and augmented version of When Listening Comes Alive is now available online as an ebook and it includes a chapter on Listening and Autism, the subject of his most recent clinical preoccupation. Paul Madaule has also written many articles on the educational and therapeutic value of music, voice, and listening training. Paul originated “Listening Fitness With The LiFT®”, an educational-oriented and user-friendly Listening Training technique. Paul’s work at The Listening Centre is the central theme of Norman Doidge MD chapter entitled A Bridge of Sound in his 2015 best seller The Brain’s way of Healing on neuroplasticity.
Websites: www.listeningcentre.com and www.listeningfitness.com
Photo: Paul Madaule / The Listening Centre
Interview:
As an “ear tuner”, I use music to improve and develop the listening skills of people of all ages suffering from a wide range of issues affecting their learning, language, communication, and sense of self. After more than thirtyfive years of practice, not a day goes by without one of these “wow moments”! What music can do keeps me astounded. For me, what’s most impressive about music is that, whoever we are, music finds a way to reach us. When I say “we”, I do not refer exclusively to the human species, but “we” as living beings because music has an impact on animals as well as plants. Music also reaches us in situations where very little does, from the severely brain injured to the comatose; it is our life companion from our pre-natal days to our last moments.
Closer to home, there was a time in my life when I desperately wanted to access music, but I couldn’t. I wanted to play guitar but motor and coordination issues made it impossible to dissociate the movements of my right and left hand. I wanted to sing but, while I was able to carry a tune, my voice was flat and bland, and I was painfully off beat. The learning disability which affected my reading, writing, organization skills, and self-expression had also cut me off music. If there is such a thing as musical intelligence, I was a musical idiot. This is what I thought until I benefited from a listening training program with Dr. Alfred Tomatis when music came to my rescue. I couldn’t access music but music could access me. Now I am able to say that, thanks to music, I resumed a harmonious and meaningful life dedicated to helping others with similar listening related difficulties – and using music to do so.
Some of my most astounding professional experiences have to do with the toughest kids to reach out to and to engage – the autistic children. Time and time again, I have seen them coming out of their shell, at least for a few precious moments, to the sound and rhythms of music. This in itself is not sufficient. There is still a lot to be done, but the contact has been made, something has ignited. Music provides the Ariadne thread which keeps us connected with the child. Music has the capacity to inject life within us. It is oxygen for the body, mind, and spirit. Music is the voice of life. What’s more spiritual than that!
“Music has the capacity to inject life within us. It is oxygen for the body, mind, and spirit. Music is the voice of life. What’s more spiritual than that!”
– Paul Madaule, author of “When Listening Comes Alive: A Guide To Effective Learning And Communication”
