Alumni to Watch

Persephone Dimson (BM, Music Therapy, '85) has combined her music therapy training with her skills as a musician to create a unique career path. Dimson's company, Demeter Music Productions, is a licensed talent agency, staging live musical performances throughout the state. Her company's mission is to provide positive programming that promotes community, family, self-esteem, and multi-cultural awareness and acceptance, as well as health and healing through music. Her eclectic career as a performing musician, workshop leader, composer, kids program performer, and music therapist clearly reflects her mission and that of her company.

Dimson initially came to ASU Herberger College of the Arts from Toronto, Canada to pursue a degree in jazz performance. Once at the college, she became aware of the school of music's music therapy program. It appealed to her because of the healing effects of music she herself experienced as a child.

"Music offered me a safe way to communicate my feelings about what was going on in my personal life," Dimson says. "My brother and I would 'jam' in the sunroom and make up all kinds of jingles and songs — quickly turning a bad day into a better one."

Dimson also wished for her music to have individual and personal impact — not just a broad impact from the stage. Though she eventually switched her major to music therapy, Dimson maintains a successful career as a multi-faceted performing musician, playing classical, contemporary, jazz and multicultural music.

It is difficult to describe the many hats that Dimson wears as part of Demeter Music Productions. Perhaps she is best known throughout Arizona for her highly successful interactive music programs for children, presented in malls and other community venues. The program combines music, theater, colorful costumes and her trained cockatoo, Maimou, in an entertaining, educational experience for children.

dimson But that's just the beginning. Dimson plays jazz gigs, organizes and leads large music festivals, and conducts workshops for teachers on using music in the classroom. Dimson also maintains a music therapy practice with a client base that includes children with autism and developmental delays, older adults in day programs, individuals with neurological disorders and people in hospice care. Dimson's impact is diverse and far-reaching, not only in Arizona, but also throughout the United States and Canada.

"Once I was working with an 8-year-old sickle cell anemia client who was refusing a blood transfusion. I asked him why he was feeling so angry and he shared that he didn't want to be in the hospital. He wanted to play sports and be outside," Dimson explains. "I started singing the 'I wanna play sports blues' with harmonica and keyboard. The boy soon joined in and expressed more of his feelings through the song. By the end of our session, he was laughing and ready to agree to the transfusion."

Currently, Dimson is working on a series of compositions and is developing a program for public television. She has kept in touch with her alma mater: She composed and arranged music for the ASU School of Theatre and Film's Black Women's Blues in 2001 and she keeps in touch with her classmates both in music therapy and jazz performance.

Persephone Dimson in truly an "Alumni to Watch."

For more information on Dimson's performances and programs, visit http://demetermusic.com.

As interviewed and written by Dimson's favorite faculty member, Barbara Crow, professor of music therapy.

e and wonderful to work with. It's a simple goal, but if the next five years go as well as the past, I know we will get there."