Nicole Richard

Biography

Originally from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Nicole Richard Williams is a course instructor at Belmont University School of Music. She has a Master of Music and Health Sciences with a Collaborative Specialization in Neuroscience from the University of Toronto (2018), and a Bachelor of Music Therapy from the Canadian Mennonite University (2014). Prior to joining Belmont, Nicole has been working on her Ph.D. in Music and Health Sciences at the University of Toronto, under the supervision of Dr. Michael Thaut. Her research focuses on the benefits and challenges of telehealth music therapy, and on the impact of music for movement skills in autistic individuals. She has received many awards, including a President’s Medal (Canadian Mennonite University, 2013), University of Toronto Research Fellowship (2017-2022), and Ontario Graduate Scholarships (Government of Ontario, 2019; 2020).

As an educator, Nicole has been Assistant Faculty for the Academy of Neurologic Music Therapy since 2020 and has taught and assisted in several courses at the University of Toronto since 2018. She has also provided guest lectures for several universities in Canada and the U.S. A clinical supervisor since 2014, Nicole has supervised many undergraduate and graduate students and interns and has completed advanced supervision training from the Canadian Association of Music Therapists. As a clinician, in 2014 she founded a music therapy business called Enliven Music Therapy in Winnipeg, MB, before becoming employed at Bang A Beat Family-Centred Therapies, also in Winnipeg. Her clinical work continued in Toronto while pursuing graduate studies. Nicole has worked with a number of clinical populations including individuals on the autism spectrum, older adults with dementia, patients recovering from stroke, at-risk youth, and children and adults suffering from mental health disorders and trauma.

Nicole is a member of the Canadian Association of Music Therapists and the American Music Therapy Association, as well as the Society for Music Perception and Cognition. She has presented her research at many regional and national conferences in Canada and the U.S., and her work has been published in journals such as Frontiers in Auditory Cognitive Neuroscience and NeuroRehabilitation.