Rachel’s Blog

There’s a care home, just around the corner from my flat that I visit roughly once a month. I really like this care home – it’s got really high staff ratios, it feels like a home (rather than an institution) and the staff treat all the residents with friendliness and respect. There’s a mixture of people here, but mainly people are here either because they have advanced dementia, or because their physical infirmities have become too severe to cope with in their own homes. I had a wonderful time singing there in April with Mrs. D. This isn’t unusual – she lives with dementia, is sweet natured, smiles and conducts, claps and taps along to the music, and I’ve been visiting the place for 6 months or more.

But I have never heard her voice.

Until that wonderful day in April. When I arrived she seemed radiant – the care worker explained afterwards she had, unusually, allowed the hair dresser to wash and set her hair. And she danced as I began to play, and then sat and sang along with most of the songs, commenting on them as we went, with various levels of lucidity. We finished with a hymn, and as I was putting away my guitar she came and sat next to me and explained that this hymn was important and meaningful, and had had meaning for her.

On Saturday Sally Mears and I ran an afternoon of singing in Trinity Church, Abingdon – and someone was filming (unbeknown to me at the time!) See Youtube video below of people singing Richard Crossland’s ‘There’s a Girl That I Love’. Sally is at the piano, and you can see me wondering around bringing in the 4 different parts. We were raising money for Christian Aid, and I estimate there were between 50 and 60 people present.

I recently came across Singing Hospitals for the first time at an evening Singing and Health event at the Dana Centre at London’s Science Museum. In trying to find out more about this organisation I came across this video of Wolfgang Bossinger interveiwing Grenville Hancox. Professor Hancox was one of my tutors when I was an undergraduate at Canterbury Christ Church University and it’s great to hear again the richness and breadth of the area of singing and health, and the roots of the research work being done at Canterbury. I’ll save a post on Singing Hospitals for another time!

Meanwhile, enjoy!

A FREE half day Singing and Health ‘unconference’ will be held on Friday 8th April, 10am -1pm at Peace House, Paradise Street (sounds dreamy I know) in Oxford.

The idea was formulated in a bakery in Headington last month with the lovely folk from Joined Up singing. We have seen there is a demand for singing in health and social care settings – as an area it has a lot of potential, and with organisations such as Musica, Sidney De Haan Centre for Arts and Health Research, The Alzheimer’s Society rolling out Singing for the Brain groups, and The Music Well, it’s about time we got together in Oxfordshire – and found out a bit how we can help each other.

So, who is the event for? It’s for anyone interested in singing and health. You might be someone interested in leading singing with people but not sure how to get started, you might be a health professional wanting to know how you can start a singing project, or you might have lots of experience as a music practitioner or as a music therapist. Whoever you are, please be bold, and come along! It’s a great chance to meet others working in the same area, to share together, and to explore new ideas and possibilities.

The morning will be organised using open space principles (if this is a new idea to you this video from Transition Towns project is an excellent introduction to the structure) and we will have expert facilitation from Tim Davies to keep things moving. Open Space means the agenda is formed by the people who come, so please be prepared to speak up, share an idea, suggest a topic for discussion, or even lead a song.

Practicalities

To find Peace House and for details of how best to travel there please visit Fellowship of Reconciliation’s website here.

We will be using two spaces at Peace House – The Henry Hodgkin Room downstairs which has disabled access, and the library upstairs.

Light refreshments will be provided (tea and cake)

The event is free, although there will be an opportunity to make a contribution to the cost of the day.

To register your interest in coming, please contact Rachel Smith by telephone: 07709 302038 or by email to rachel@rmsmith.org.uk.

I look forward to seeing you there!

This week I turned 26 years “old”. Whilst some people seem to become somewhat jittery on the approach to 30, I am not particularly concerned because every week I am privileged to work with thousands of years of human experience. This can sometimes make me feel ill-equipped in terms of my experiences, although I know that in the people around me the resources are already there to tap. I don’t believe that wisdom is something that automatically comes with age, but something I do see a lot in my work with older adults is the level of resilience – a product of experience, social capital, and, yes, a bit of wisdom too. This notion of resiliency comes to me from different directions. Tim Davies has written on the subject of Positive Youth Development which explores resiliency as an alternative to excluding risk from the lives of young people. Of course we all deal with risk everyday – living is risky and we don’t know what is just around the corner. I see people dealing with the implications of cancer diagnoses, bereavements, living with dementia, or coping with a loss of mobility. Seeing the resiliency in the older people I work with helps me come to terms with seeing many of the difficulties older people face.

This is a really short post. I want to round it off with a few quotes:

And in the end, it’s not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years.

Abraham Lincoln

How does one keep from “growing old inside”? Surely only in community. The only way to make friends with time is to stay friends with people…. Taking community seriously not only gives us the companionship we need, it also relieves us of the notion that we are indispensable.

Robert McAfee Brow

(We) never cease to stand like curious children before the great mystery into which we were born.

Albert Einstein

I have been overwhelmed with emails and messages from people who are interested in Singing for the Brain, who would like to train as leaders, or who would like to take their friend or relative to a group.

This is wonderful because it says to me there are lots of people who are convinced that singing really makes a difference to the lives of people living with dementia, and their friends, families and carers; and it also says there are many people who are prepared to train to do this work – fantastic news!

There are several different roles in a Singing for the Brain group. The most obvious one is Singing Facilitator, although this role is supported by volunteers, either specific ‘singing volunteers’ who might be called upon to lead a section of the group in part of a round, and volunteers who might not consider themselves ‘singers’ but who help out with tea and coffee, welcoming people and giving out name badges if these are used, arranging the chairs, assisting with the giving out of books, and helping people find their page numbers or to use different percussion instruments. It’s important also to recognise the hard work the dementia support workers (employed by the Alzheimer’s Society) put in to make these groups happen, and the support we have from the mental health trust who send Community Psychiatric Nurses and Occupational Therapists to be additional supports.

There is some Singing facilitator and volunteer training available on an ad hoc basis, mainly based in the South West region as this is currently the only place where there is a Singing for the Brain Co-ordinator. If you don’t live in this region, the best thing to do is to get in touch with your local Alzheimer’s Society office to find out if there is something going on in your area, or to register your interest. For more information, please visit the Alzheimer’s Society website page on Singing for the Brain: http://www.alzheimers.org.uk/site/scripts/documents_info.php?documentID=760

A month or so back someone asked me for a few pointers about community singing groups/ community choirs, so I came up with some ideas and issues that I have come across and here they are in a quick blog post:

• Do they perform publicly, or is it just for fun? If it is just for fun what other milestones might be put in place so there is a sense of direction. I still struggle with this particular issue with my non-performing groups, but things we do include singing for a short stint at a christmas fair (so not a whole concert), singing at a care home, going on boat trips and going for meals (these last two they organise themselves). Others might include making a CD, or joining with a larger community sing such as Wateraid’s Sing for Water. On the other hand, these sorts of things may not need to happen at all.

• Think about outcomes not just outputs because this can free you up creatively – I found working on a project that said here’s a basic framework (1 hour per week) – these are the outcomes we want (uplifting, creating something, owning and belonging, building confidence etc) … now off you go, was a far more helpful approach than simply defining the output, I think because it invited me to use my imagination and put together in a new way all of my skills and knowledge and prior experience.

• I guess with this sort of choir (community choir) members won’t be auditioned and won’t be expected to read music, so that might require a different approach to teaching new music. I teach a lot by ear, singing a line and asking the group to repeat it back. It is repetitive but it works. I also wave my hands around to indicate pitch, a la the Iona Big Sing people, and Chris Rowbury talks about using graphic scores (although I’ve not used this technique)

• How can warm-ups be fun and engaging? Youth Music, Sing for Pleasure and Voice Works publications are all really good for repertoire and warm-ups, and although mainly written with children and young people in mind, they work just as well for adults.

• How are people welcomed and how is the group helped to bond? e.g. getting to know everyones’ names

• Keep repertoire varied – don’t be afraid of different languages, different cultures. Rounds can be wonderfully effective ways of initiating harmony singing without having to learn a part. Also ‘partner songs’ – I’m using the song Shalom with the English folk melody Dives and Lazarus together and somehow they work

• Be clear on values – a performance-focussed choir might define itself by its size, sound, repertoire, a community choir may not define itself by its performances, but perhaps by the equalising nature of singing (for example)

If I can stop one heart from breaking,

I shall not live in vain ;

If I can ease one life the aching,

Or cool one pain,

Or help one lonely person

Into happiness again,

I shall not live in vain.

A favourite poem by 19th Century American poet, Emily Dickinson; it inspires my work.

I was struck that the version I am familiar with, published in 101 Poems To Keep You Sane, is different from the one I find everywhere else, whose 5th and 6th lines read ‘Or help one fainting robin / Unto his nest again,’ The meaning, however, feels the same, that pain is unavoidable but healing is possible.

http://www.nationalpoetryday.co.uk/

On Thursday Age UK’s North Leigh Singing for Fun group performed a wonderful concert of summer music in Warneford Hospital Chapel. The concert was about forty minutes long and consisted of Irish songs, church music, African songs and finished off with jazz and spirituals.

The aims of the concert were:

• To give the Age UK group the opportunity to sing in a beautiful setting with a beautiful acoustic
• To challenge the Age UK group to perform to help improve the group sound: performance helps to sharpen the focus.
• To give in-patients an opportunity to engage with live music
• To challenge stigma around mental health

I am so proud of the Age UK group because to start with it was a slightly off the wall idea ‘I know everyone, let’s go and sing at the mental health unit!’

For people with little experience of mental health, mental health units can seem disturbing places. There is concern that people will be unpredictable, behave in a disturbing way, even be violent. The reality is that on Thursday, we were pushed to identify the service users from the care staff. Mental health problems affect 1 in 4 people at some point in their lives. At the end of the concert one person (a patient) said ‘I feel like a real person’ showing the importance of normalising mental health environments and keeping in-patients connected and included. Others were moved to tears by the singing, demonstrating the powerful tool music can be.

I am absolutely thrilled that this endeavour went so well. We had a good audience, the singers performed the best they ever had, and the link between hospital and community was strengthened. Someone even suggested we go back at Christmas!

I’ve been working with an organisation in Oxfordshire which works with older adults and adults of working age with a specific disability. I had been working with one group, and I was invited to work with another, being told they were a similar group in terms of age and ability. Great, I thought, I can do what I’ve already done with the existing group.

Big mistake.

The group, whilst similar in age and physical ability, were far less communicative and confident. They were so self-conscious that the format which worked so well for the other group seemed to freeze this group. All my suggestions were met with negativity, and I left feeling very unhappy about my ability to connect with people, and not ever wanting to return. I mentioned to the workers and volunteers how I felt and they were reassuring and were able to get some more specific feedback from the participants.

I was surprised (and a little anxious) when I was asked to go back. The workers said the group enjoyed the session and they gave me a few pointers about what to change. I spent more time at the beginning talking to people – it’s important to overcome shyness in these situations. I scrapped the vocal warm-up, we sat around the tables, instead of clearing a space to make a circle (something of a holy cow), and we used different percussion instruments which we discussed and experimented with. We sang a variety of songs, and I accompanied with both the guitar and the shruti box to provide plenty of cushion to peoples’ voices. After I had understood the deep lack of self-confidence, I was able to tailor the workshop to accommodate people’s need for a sense of security and nurture. The percussion instruments deflect away from the person; sitting around tables instead of in a circle means there is no empty space to fill, and there is a physical barrier; providing accompaniments to songs which would usually be unaccompanied means there is no sense of a ‘naked’ voice.

This time around, the session went really well. Everyone was able to join in, either through percussion or with their voices, or through movement. We created an intimate, trusting atmosphere, as after songs people felt able to reflect on what the song meant to them and in some cases shed tears of emotion.

I am so grateful now I was given a second opportunity to work with this group. Sometimes it just takes a couple of goes to get it right, and a little time to get to know people.