Posts Tagged ‘music in healthcare’

Mary Lou circles the building up and down all day long using her walker.
“Come and sit down,” I said, as I pulled up a chair at one of the dining room tables.
I knew she liked rhythm. I also knew that she played the piano for years and is constantly drumming her fingers in some kind of rhythm.
I placed a drum in front of her and gave her both drumsticks. I played a rhythm on the table and she played one back. We experimented with the natural rhythm of words, using songs and rhymes from childhood like “Pease Porridge Hot”. We tapped the rhythms without the words. As we drummed, more and more songs were popping into our heads.
“Listen to THIS one!” I said with gusto.
“What about THIS one!” Mary Lou would say.
We started drawing a crowd. I handed a tamborine to one of them and a shaker to another and before long, we had a rhythm band. It was made up of those who normally would not participate in organized activities. We sang. We talked. We laughed, and we listened to the overall effect of many instruments.

Ginny spends her days in a wheelchair with her head down. She is in the end-stages of Alzheimer’s. She cannot focus enough to do very much at all. Last week, I placed a Reverie Harp on her lap. I strummed it once and waited to see what she would do. We sat for several minutes in silence and she moved her hand on the strings and enjoyed the thrill of hearing the music that she was making. We sat together for the next 20 minutes experimenting with the sounds. I could feel the release.

Ellen needed an outlet for her music. I started doing Dancing Hands with her one-on-one. She is creative with movement and rhythm. The handtaps brought that out. In this picture, we are tapping to the Beatles. One time, recently, when Ellen was depressed, we started singing every song we could think of from our childhood. There was a bond and also healing for emotions.