About

Petra Kern, Ph.D., MT-BC, MTA, DMtG is a board certified music therapist in the USA, Canada, and Germany and earned her doctoral degree from the School of Medicine at the University of Witten/Herdecke. Currently, she is a Fulbright Specialist (2024–2027) and recently worked with Sinfonía por el Perú in Lima. Beforehand,  she taught at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna,  supported the inaugural music therapy program at the University of Rhode Island and offered over 20 hybrid courses at the University of Louisville where she was recognized as “Faculty Favorite.” Previously Dr. Kern taught at Augsburg College, Marylhurst University (recipient of the Faculty Innovation and Excellence Award), the State University of New York at New Paltz, the University of Windsor in Canada, and continues to supervise student telepractice sessions and guest lectures at universities worldwide.

Over the past 30 years, Dr. Kern has worked in many clinical settings, serving the youngest to the oldest with various abilities and health issues. Her clinical and research focus is on early childhood music therapy. In 2008, she received the Research/Publications Award of the American Music Therapy Association (AMTA) for her studies conducted with young children with autism spectrum disorder at the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her work has been published in the Journal of Intergenerational Relationships, Young Exceptional Children, Young Children, Children & Families, the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, World Scientific, the Journal of Music Therapy, Music Therapy Perspectives, Music Therapy Today, and imagine. Dr. Petra Kern is the co-editor of the highly acclaimed book Early Childhood Music Therapy and Autism Spectrum Disorder: Supporting Young Children and Their Families now in its second edition. 

Dr. Petra Kern is a former President of the World Federation of Music Therapy (WFMT) and recipient of the first international Service Award of WFMT. She provided leadership on numerous national and international music therapy committees and boards such as the Steering Committee of AMTA’s Strategic Priority on Music Therapy and ASD and the Board of Directors of the Certification Board of Music Therapy (CBMT). Recently, she served as the Scientific Committee Chair of the 2023 World Congress of Music Therapy. She is the editor of imagine, and received the 2017 WRAMTA Publication Award for this primary early childhood music therapy multimedia e-journal. Dr. Kern continues her commitment to the editorial boards of the Canadian Journal of Music Therapy, and the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine. She is also a frequent international speaker and shared her expertise with colleagues and clients in North America, Latin America, Asia, Australia, Arabia, Africa, and Europe. She is the recipient of the 2019 AMTA “Award of Merit.”