Music Transforms Lives in Healthcare Settings

By Laurie Evan Fraser and Jacqui Atkin

UCC at Sunnybrook Hospital

 In June of 1994, the Upper Canada Choristers held their first community outreach concert at Sunnybrook Hospital in the George Hees lobby of K wing. Through the years we have returned to Sunnybrook Hospital many times, sometimes bringing children's school choirs to sing with us, and we always feel privileged to share our music with the veterans.

On one such occasion we finished our performance with some singalong selections that elicited enthusiastic participation from the audience. One gentleman, in a wheelchair, was singing with great gusto and joy. A staff member came over at the end to tell us that he had been living at Sunnybrook for several months and had been thought to be totally non-verbal. She was amazed at his transformation.

“Music hath charms that soothe the savage breast.”

UCC at Christie Gardens Seniors Residency

At various times we have shared our music in facilities in which family members of our choristers are staying. The wife of one of our basses suffered from Pick's disease, a type of dementia. She had been a singing teacher for many years, and long after failing to recognize her husband, she loved to sing along with him at our concerts.

We went out to Etobicoke General Hospital to sing for their psychiatric ward. On one occasion, we were shown to the room where we would sing and then told that our audience would be listening from across the hall because they were too fragile to be in the same room with the singers. At the conclusion of our performance, as we passed by the room where the patients had gathered, they stood and applauded.

One Christmas morning, a small but valiant group of our singers went to a long-term care facility to sing carols. We went from floor to floor and room to room. One of the floors was a lock-down dementia ward. As we sang, we noticed an older gentleman singing with us. He had a beautiful voice and knew all the lyrics by heart. It was not until we were leaving that ward that we realized he was not one of the staff. The staff had to remind him that he was not to leave. They told us they didn't know he was verbal.

Another Christmas morning, we went to sing at a small, understaffed facility. We started out on the main floor and then moved up to the second floor, singing by the nurses' station. Residents came to their doorways to listen and sing with us. As we got ready to leave, two staff members came up to us in tears and said, “You have made this Christmas more than a workday. You have helped us make it special.”

We have seen first-hand the healing power of music.