My first experiences of sharing healing music were with seniors with Alzheimer’s and dementia, starting around 2009. Starting then, I continued to make many visits to skilled nursing facilities, as well as senior day programs.
“We need to take you home with us. She’s speaking in full sentences, which she has not been doing since she had a stroke.” – Family member of person I played music for in the hospital
Music is universally recognized as a healing tool for people in “memory care” facilities. Even during my training as a CMP (Certified Music Practitioner), our guidance for playing for people with Alzheimer’s and dementia, was to play “familiar music”. Current guidance recognizes that it’s even better to play the music the individual would have been exposed to during their teenage years (13-19).
The world of people in their sunset years is one of the worlds I love to work in. With the right music for the right person, magic can happen. I even returned for more musical training for seniors with Alzheimer’s and dementia, and became a certified Village Song music practitioner, learning to lead music circles for groups of seniors in memory care settings. That training led to even more gigs at skilled nursing, assisted living, and senior day programs.
Family members of the elders experiencing dementia, love to come to the music classes, because it sometimes opens up a window for interacting with their loved ones, from a more “awake” and conversant state.
I’ve been reflecting on this power of music recently, and got inspired to start making some Spotify playlists for the benefit of elders with Alzheimer’s and dementia.
The first one I made is populated with a mix of songs, including those that I had good responses from, when working with elders at memory care facilities.
Feel free to follow my profile on Spotify to see the additional eldercare playlists I’m working on (scroll to the bottom), organized by the birth year of the intended audience. Those will include the popular music of their teenage years (which will be different for each birth year).