Healing Power of Music by Grace

Healing Power of Music by Grace - June 2020 Scholarship Essay

I discovered the national service organization, Alzheimer's Buddies, as I was browsing Vanderbilt's long list of organizations for freshmen to join as they become accumulated to campus and begin to immerse themselves in their passions. I signed up with a single-click and could not imagine what this would lead to in the next few months of my life.

The facility is called Abe's Garden, Memory Care Center of Excellence. The patients at Abe's Garden all have intermediate-to-late stages of Alzheimer's Disease or severe dementia. After their primary caretakers gave us introductions of each resident, I was able to learn a little bit about each person and their life stories before their debilitating condition took over most of their lives. Each of us volunteers then got paired with a resident based on a small questionnaire we had completed previously. I was paired with Alice, an elderly woman from Louisiana who had late-stage Alzheimer's and was brought to Abe's Garden by her daughter for high quality care.

From then on, every Sunday from three to five in the afternoon I would meet with Alice and get to know her better. She was always unsure who I was but was so gracious in letting me follow her around the house, doing household chores she said she had to complete every day. There was never a week where she remembered my name or face and I would always reintroduce myself every time as a volunteer, but she was always so happy to be spending time with me.

It was not until one day when she said she did not feel like doing much that I had the idea of playing music for her as a relaxing activity. I brought her to the baby grand in one of the facility's many dining rooms and began to play traditional hymns. "Come Thou Fount Every Blessing", "Sweet Hour of Prayer", "Be Thou my Vision". I had not played these since my senior year of high school when I had a job playing as the accompanist at a local church and thus barely remembered the chords, much less the words.

It took me a moment to suddenly realize that Alice was singing every note of "Amazing Grace" as I played it softly in F-sharp Major. She had difficulties remembering who I was or what I looked like, but I felt so much joy seeing that my playing had the power to bring back something important of hers from the past. She had such a bright smile on her face with her eyes closed while singing. That was one visit I will never forget.

The small acts of service continue to be so personally fulfilling as my weekly visits always leave Alice with a smile. In addition to Alzheimer's Buddies, I am a therapeutic music volunteer at the Vanderbilt Hospital and Medical Center as well, where I perform music a few hours every week for patients staying in the surgical, medical, and neuro intensive care units. I truly believe music has the power to help all types patients to reconnect with the world in a meaningful way. It serves as a universal platform of empathy, enhances the quality of human emotions, offers a space to form relationships with those who may be unable to communicate in other ways, and for Alice, evokes memories of the past. Music can heal the soul. And sometimes, that can be the most powerful.

Through these special experiences I continue pursuing at Vanderbilt, I have learned how special and fulfilling giving back to the community truly is. It is to act with a passion of serving others and leave behind a unique part of myself that can be cherished by others. For me, this is at the intersection between medicine and music. I am now a rising sophomore and have recently declared a double major in Cognitive Science and Piano Performance. During my time in college, it is my strongest hope to gain knowledge as both a developing scientist and musician and make a positive impact on the world, an impact greater than I could achieve without in-depth studies into each discipline. Ultimately, serving others with the knowledge and skills I have gained from my education has sparked my goal of a career in music therapy to make a difference with my love for healing the mind and body through music. I hope to improve upon the musical therapy industry and emphasize the importance of bringing joy to patients along with physical and mental healing.

Now, in the unsettling times the world has come to be in, I can only hope to once more play the piano for Alice, to see her eyes light up in joy and her face break out in a smile as she remembers every word of the music. I can only hope.