Michael Feinstein to Host MUSIC HAS POWER Awards, 9/7

Multi-platinum-selling, five-time Grammy-nominated entertainer Michael Feinstein will host and headline a celebration of music's therapeutic power to heal when the Institute for Music and Neurologic Function's Music Has Power Awards return to Feinstein's at Loews Regency - The Nightclub of New York on September 7, 2011.

The Music Has Power Awards, generously underwritten by BNY Mellon Wealth Management, are presented annually by the Institute for Music and Neurologic Function (IMNF) to honor those individuals in the arts, sciences and business communities whose work contributes to the advancement of vital and often groundbreaking music therapy research, development and programs.

The 2011 recipients of the Music Has Power Awards are the acclaimed filmmaker Jim Kohlberg and the renowned neurologist Dr. Steven A. Sparr.

"We honor film director/producer Jim Kohlberg for his most recent work, ‘The Music Never Stopped,' because it advanced greater public awareness of the power of music therapy to reconnect people with serious brain injuries and degenerative neurological diseases with their friends and loved ones," explains IMNF Executive Director Dr. Concetta Tomaino. "Thanks to Jim Kohlberg's film, more people than ever before are aware of the breakthrough music-based therapies and treatments that are available should they or their loved ones need them."

Kohlberg's film "The Music Never Stopped" is based on a case study by Dr. Oliver Sacks (and a case that took place at Beth Abraham), and chronicles the estranged relationship between a father and his brain-injured son and the extraordinary power of music to reconnect the two.

Dr. Steven A. Sparr is a distinguished neurologist whose clinical research in stroke and behavioral neurology placed special focus on the neurology of music. Dr. Sparr has served as the director of the neurology of music program at the Academy of Neurology annual meetings for several years running, and has lectured on the subject both here in the United States and internationally.

A member of the IMNF Scientific Advisory Board, Dr. Sparr is also a founding member and director of neuro-rehabilitation at the Stern Stroke Center at Montefiore Medical Center and the director of Neurology Clerkship at Albert Einstein College of Medicine.

"Dr. Sparr's research, his writings and his lectures all serve to build greater awareness and appreciation among his fellow neurologists and the broader medical community of the power and efficacy of music therapy to help heal people with stroke, traumatic brain injuries and degenerative neurological diseases such as Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease and other dementias," states Dr. Tomaino. "The more doctors are aware of this therapy, the more scientists are inspired to continue their music/brain research, the greater advances we can make and the greater the number of people we can help."

The 2011 Music Has Power Awards start at 6 p.m. and will feature a live performance by Michael Feinstein. As a noted singer and pianist, Feinstein gives more than 200 classic pop music shows a year and is nationally recognized for celebrating America's popular song heritage. His new PBS concert special, The Sinatra Legacy, is currently airing across the country; and the companion CD will be released in October.

Through this celebration, funds raised will support music therapy programs, along with clinical and scientific research. Previous recipients of the Music Has Power Awards include Dr. Oliver Sacks, Mickey Hart, Remo Belli, Moby, and Henry Z. Steinway.

For tickets or sponsorship information please contact: Teresa DePace at (718) 519-5880, fax (718) 519-4240 or e-mail TDePace@bethabe.org.

The Institute for Music and Neurologic Function is a not-for-profit, 501(c) (3) organization and a member of Beth Abraham Family of Health Services. Founded in 1995, the IMNF is driven by 35 years of clinical observations on the actual effects of music on different types of physical and neurological trauma. Directed by renowned music therapist Dr. Concetta M. Tomaino, with medical guidance from distinguished neurologist Dr. Oliver Sacks, its distinctive setting allows researchers to not only apply their theories, but to follow patient rehabilitation in the long term.

The Institute actively collaborates with researchers and practitioners at other leading organizations to advance world progress in understanding and applying the power of music to promote healing and wellness. Some of the Institute's most promising research has been in the areas of music and language, memory, and recovery from nerve injury - leading to groundbreaking discoveries as to how music therapy can heal. For more information, visit www.imnf.org.

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