Hello
My name is Nick, and I started Nightingale Music Therapy at the end of 2025. I moved to Western North Carolina in 2019 to attend Appalachian State University. Since then, these mountains have become my home, and I’ve noticed a need for alternatives to talk therapy in our strong mountain communities. So, I decided to stick around and help people achieve their health goals while expressing their feelings and navigating life’s challenges together.
My Music Therapy Approach
I approach my work with an improvisational and holistic focus in music therapy to ensure the session space is flexible and growth oriented. Whoever I am sitting with, and wherever they are at in life, I do my best to support them in using their own strengths and experiences to facilitate positive changes. While my clinical focus throughout my masters education was geared towards children with disabilities within the school system, much of what I learned there shaped my practice with people of all ages and situations. I learned that words aren’t always necessary for growth to take place – a particular advantage of music therapy work. Music might be able to transcend language and words, but I have witnessed it facilitate and transform words and meaning more often.
Education
I studied music therapy at Appalachian State University before completing my six months of internship at a private practice in Charlotte and Gastonia, NC, respectively. I had the pleasure of working in memory care settings, preschools, a school for people with disabilities, as well as a center for adults in substance use disorder recovery. I passed my board-certification exam in the summer of 2024 and finished my master’s in music therapy course requirements and am completing my certificate in nonprofit administration. I am expecting my official degree and certificate for each in August of 2026!