Therese Schroeder-Sheker
Therese Schroeder-Sheker is a musician, educator, clinician, and academic dean of the School of Music-Thanatology, which was housed at St. Patrick Hospital in Missoula, Montana from 1992 to 2002.
Schroeder-Sheker, using voice and harp, works as a music-thanatologist, a relatively new discipline, where the practitioner works with those who are actively dying or have received a terminal diagnosis with a life expectancy of less than six months. The goals of music-thanatology include reduction of physical as well as emotional pain, creation of a supportive environment while dying, helping the patient become more conscious of their own death process, and changing the approach to death within established structures. Schroeder-Sheker was honored by the New York Open Center in 1997 for her Music Thanatology. Her music has been used in documentaries and released commercially.
CD and Video
Schroeder-Sheker has produced numerous recorded works. Among those works are:- Celebrant: The Historical Harp,, Lady Reason Records.
- The Queen's Minstrel, Windham Hill Records., Valley Entertainment.
- Rosa Mystica, Celestial Harmonies
- In Dulci Jubilo Celestial Harmonies
- Inside the Miracle: Enduring Illness, Approaching Wholeness, spoken words by Mark Nepo. Parabola AudioTapes
- Chalice of Repose: A Contemplative Musician's Approach to Death and Dying. videotape, 1997.
- Therese Schroeder-Sheker and The Chalice of Repose Project: A Contemplative Musician's Approach to Death and Dying, DVD, Pleroma Press, 2007.