"Though it can be written, music cannot be captured. Belonging to everything, it owns nothing. Always giving, never taking, unnoticed, unexplained it benefits everyone. Music evokes what has always been, helping us to come to terms with ourselves," writes John M. Ortiz in The Tao of Music. The author, a composer, multi-instrumentalist, and psychologist, has written an imaginative and practical resource that uses sound and music as tools for growth, change, healing, creativity, and personal transformation. He explains various psychomusicology techniques including entrainment, rhythmic synchronicity, contextual cuing, toning, chanting, and affirmations in psychomusical formats.

The Tao of music, he notes, "is experienced through the freedom that comes from flowing with our internal, natural rhythms." Ortiz presents 41 exercises where music functions as a catalyst to deal with pain, depression, anger, and lack of self-esteem. Throughout the book are 23 "musical menus" where classical, pop, soul, jazz, country, and rock tapes or CDs are suggested to engender creativity, centering, relaxation, intimacy, and learning. The Tao of Music is the best all-around volume for those who want to utilize music as a resource for spiritual growth.