[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"detail-sidebar-cat-0-en-105":3,"doc-seo-156497-105":59,"doc-detail-156497-en":131},{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":6},0,"success",[7,13,18,23,28,33,38,43,48,51,55],{"id":8,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":10,"show_sort_weight":11,"slug":12},1,"Document","Story & Novel",90,"story-novel",{"id":14,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":15,"show_sort_weight":16,"slug":17},2,"Literature",80,"literature",{"id":19,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":20,"show_sort_weight":21,"slug":22},4,"Exam",70,"exam",{"id":24,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":25,"show_sort_weight":26,"slug":27},5,"Comic",60,"comic",{"id":29,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":30,"show_sort_weight":31,"slug":32},6,"Technology",50,"technology",{"id":34,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":35,"show_sort_weight":36,"slug":37},7,"Healthcare",40,"healthcare",{"id":39,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":40,"show_sort_weight":41,"slug":42},8,"Research & Report",30,"research-report",{"id":44,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":45,"show_sort_weight":46,"slug":47},9,"Religion & Spirituality",20,"religion-spirituality",{"id":46,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":49,"show_sort_weight":46,"slug":50},"World Cup","world-cup",{"id":52,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":53,"show_sort_weight":52,"slug":54},10,"Lifestyle","lifestyle",{"id":56,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":57,"show_sort_weight":24,"slug":58},19,"General","general",{"code":4,"msg":60,"data":61},"ok",{"site_id":62,"language":63,"slug":64,"title":65,"keywords":66,"description":67,"schema_data":68,"social_meta":124,"head_meta":126,"extra_data":128,"updated_unix":130},105,"en","wanted-dead-or-alive-the-collaborative-art-of-performing-music-therapy-in-prison","Wanted Dead or Alive - The Collaborative Art of Performing Music Therapy in Prison","","Rap invites musical expressions that leverage the prisoner identity as a source of artistic credibility and creativity, contrasting with progressive rock’s emphasis on compositional complexity and technical instrumental proficiency and punk’s DIY, anti-virtuosic approach. The study examines how such differing attitudes toward music making are met, respected, and reconciled in prison music therapy group work, and how they shape strategies for “being a prisoner.” Drawing on two ethnographic cases, it introduces the musicking persona to analyze emerging musician identities and discusses implications, including dilemmas around censorship and paternalism in prison creative processes.",{"@graph":69,"@context":123},[70,84,106],{"@type":71,"itemListElement":72},"BreadcrumbList",[73,77,79,82],{"item":74,"name":75,"@type":76,"position":8},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":78,"name":9,"@type":76,"position":14},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/",{"item":80,"name":40,"@type":76,"position":81},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/research-report/",3,{"item":83,"name":65,"@type":76,"position":19},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/wanted-dead-or-alive-the-collaborative-art-of-performing-music-therapy-in-prison/156497/",{"url":83,"name":65,"@type":85,"image":86,"author":91,"headline":65,"publisher":94,"fileFormat":97,"inLanguage":63,"description":67,"dateModified":98,"datePublished":99,"encodingFormat":97,"isAccessibleForFree":100,"interactionStatistic":101},"DigitalDocument",{"url":87,"@type":88,"width":89,"height":90},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/wanted-dead-or-alive-the-collaborative-art-of-performing-music-therapy-in-prison/156497.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"Genevieve","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-11-05","2026-08-28",true,{"@type":102,"interactionType":103,"userInteractionCount":105},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":104},"ViewAction",13,{"@type":107,"mainEntity":108},"FAQPage",[109,115,119],{"name":110,"@type":111,"acceptedAnswer":112},"What is the article’s main focus in prison music therapy?","Question",{"text":113,"@type":114},"It examines how participants understand authenticity in musical performance in a Scandinavian prison, and how these views connect prisoner and musician identities.","Answer",{"name":116,"@type":111,"acceptedAnswer":117},"What does the article mean by the “musicking persona”?",{"text":118,"@type":114},"It is a concept used to explain how participants’ identities as musicians emerge through their musical participation, not only their histories or abilities.",{"name":120,"@type":111,"acceptedAnswer":121},"What practice implications does the article discuss for music therapy in prisons?",{"text":122,"@type":114},"It addresses professional dilemmas involving censorship and paternalism within creative processes carried out in prison contexts.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":83,"og:type":125,"og:title":65,"og:site_name":95,"og:description":67},"article",{"robots":127,"canonical":83},"index,follow",{"doc_id":129,"site_id":62},156497,1787960985,{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":132},{"doc_id":129,"user_id":133,"nickname":92,"user_avatar":134,"doc_module":4,"category_id":39,"category_name":40,"doc_title":65,"doc_description":67,"doc_content":135,"file_id":136,"file_url":137,"file_type":138,"file_size":139,"view_count":105,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":8,"is_downloadable":8,"audit_status":8,"page_count":140,"language":141,"language_code":63,"site_id":62,"html_lang":63,"table_of_contents":142,"faqs":143,"seo_title":144,"seo_description":67,"update_tm":130,"read_time":145,"preview_page_count":4},1374391974585,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_276721f389ce27ea32af1340a28f341c","RESEARCH | PEER REVIEWED  \nWanted Dead or Alive:  \nThe Collaborative Art of Performing Music Therapy in Prison  \nKjetil Hjørnevik 1*  \n1 The Grieg Academy—Department of Music, University of Bergen, Norway  \n* kjeti[l.hjornevik@uib. no](l.hjornevik@uib. no)  \nReceived 10 March 2025; Accepted 17 March 2026; Published 1 July 2026 Editors: Elly Scrine, Susan Hadley  \nReviewers: Vern Miller, Joy Willenbrink-Conte  \nCopyeditor: Matteo Maienza  \nAbstract  \nRap—perhaps uniquely among musical styles—invites expressions that explicitly draw on the prisoner identity as a vital resource for artistic credibility and creativity. Progressive rock often privileges an aesthetic of compositional complexity and technical proficiency on a musical instrument, whilst punk is often associated with DIY ethics and antivirtuosic approaches to musicking. How can such apparently disparate attitudes towards music making be met, respected and reconciled in music therapy group work in prison, and how do these attitudes correspond to different strategies for “being a prisoner”? This article explores music therapy in a Scandinavian prison with a focus on prisoner participants’notions of authenticity in musical performance. Through the presentation of two cases derived from an ethnographic enquiry into music therapy in prison, I introduce the musicking persona as a concept for understanding how the participants’emerging identities as musicians were defined not only by their musical histories, aesthetic preferences, cultural affiliations or musical abilities, but also by the style of their musical participation. The analysis is discussed with reference to cultural criminology and desistance research. Implications for music therapy practice are addressed, including professional dilemmas linked to censorship and paternalism in creative processes in prisons.  \nKeywords: music therapy; performance; prison; incarceration; musicking persona  \nIntroduction  \nMusic therapy in prisons is a small but expanding field of practice (Choutino, 2015). A considerable proportion of available studies focus on music therapy as treatment of mental  \nVOICES: A WORLD FORUM FOR MUSIC THERAPY | VOL 26 | NO 2 | 2026  \nPublisher: GAMUT-Grieg Academy Music Therapy Research Centre (NORCE & University of Bergen) Copyright: 2026 The Author(s). This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the [http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/](http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.  \nDOI: [https://doi.org/10.15845/voices.v26i2.4558](https://doi.org/10.15845/voices.v26i2.4558)  \nillness or as an agent for behavioural change (Chen et al., 2016; Cohen, 1987; Dickinson, 2006; Fulford, 2002; Gallagher & Steele, 2002; Glyn 2003; Gold et al., 2014; Hakvoort, 2002; Kellett et al., 2019; Reed, 2002). Other studies, including the ethnographic study upon which this article is based, emphasise community-oriented practices and music’s roles in everyday prison life (Hjørnevik, 2025; O’Grady, 2009; Tuastad & O’Grady, 2013). The use of popular music related methods such as rock band rehearsals, live concerts, collaborative songwriting, digital music production and studio recording is well documented in the music therapy literature (Gold et al., 2014; Short, 2014; Tuastad & O’Grady, 2013) and is indicated with a wide range of populations including adolescents (Crook & McFerran, 2019), in mental health settings (Solli, 2015) and with prisoners (Tuastad & Stige, 2015). Recent scholarly work suggests that participation in music therapy activities can contribute towards a coherent sense of identity in the lives of people in prison (Hjørnevik, 2025; Tuastad & Stige, 2015). This is significant since a coherent sense of identity and the ability to integrate fragmented and often chaotic life experiences into a coherent life narrative is seen as one of the most important factors","cbCaivth0N2SfwkI","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaivth0N2SfwkI","pdf",336549,15,"English","# Introduction\n# Analysing Performance","[{\"question\":\"What is the article’s main focus in prison music therapy?\",\"answer\":\"It examines how participants understand authenticity in musical performance in a Scandinavian prison, and how these views connect prisoner and musician identities.\"},{\"question\":\"What does the article mean by the “musicking persona”?\",\"answer\":\"It is a concept used to explain how participants’ identities as musicians emerge through their musical participation, not only their histories or abilities.\"},{\"question\":\"What practice implications does the article discuss for music therapy in prisons?\",\"answer\":\"It addresses professional dilemmas involving censorship and paternalism within creative processes carried out in prison contexts.\"}]","Wanted Dead or Alive - The Collaborative Art of Performing Music Therapy in Prison | PDF",38]