music that heals souls

Buenos Aires / DPA

Patients wait in long lines for turns to see physicians, mothers hold their babies close to their bosoms and scores of people walk up and down staircases, some of them carrying the results of medical tests.
But none of that seems to bother musicians and singers at the Dr. Cosme Argerich Hospital in Buenos Aires, Argentina as they tune up for a midday concert.
Patients’ curiousity is piqued as the musicians take out their instruments from their cases. In no time at all, the professional orchestra starts to play and the music, originating in a hospital waiting room, soon fills
the hospital with the notes of Verdi, Mozart and other classical greats wafting through its corridors.
The project, whose name is displayed on T-shirts worn by orchestra members: “Music for the Soul,” was created by flute player Maria Eugenia Rubio who, following a long illness and just before dying, decided to establish an orchestra which would bring hope, through music, to hospitals
The hall starts to fill with an audience of people wearing facemasks. Others arrange their crutches and their wheelchairs in the front row and the hospital room turns into a concert hall. There are male nurses, physicians, patients, family members and visitors, all enraptured by the unexpected event.
Omar is a Peruvian immigrant who listens silently. He says he has been at the hospital for a long time.
“I have been here alone, and feeling very lonely. If you don’t have anyone from your family to tell you: ‘Come on, hang in there, one day at a time,’ it is very hard… I was in a bad way but this lovely music has cheered me up, made me feel better,” he said.
The orchestra, which is now composed of 1,000 professional musicians who take turns and even transport kettle-drums for the hospital concerts, “is not only geared for hospitalized people.
“It is also meant to encourage health workers, who might be drained and exhausted after working long hours in conditions that are not always good,” says Laura Delogu, one of the orchestra leaders.
“We often see doctors and nurses who are very moved by the concerts. We visited a child-cancer hospital in Neuquen province and the physicians were crying,” said Delogu, who is a singer.
The orchestra first performs in the main hospital hall. Once that concert is over, they go upstairs, in smaller groups or as chamber orchestras, to visit patients who cannot leave their hospital rooms.
If they wish to listen to the music, patients ask for the orchestra members to visit and music is performed at a lower volume. Patients and orchestra members are equally moved by these smaller-scale performances.
“With the concert-master Marta, we were able, at the Tornu hospital, to sing to a woman who was on her deathbed,” says baritone Juan Salvador Trupia.
“The family asked us to sing a tango song that she liked very much… She was unconscious but the doctors told us that although she was unconscious, the ear continues to function at the cerebral level, and it was very moving, because her daughter and grandchildren were there,” he said.
“One of the granddaughters later wrote a very lovely letter to us telling us that her grandmother had died the following day and she told us about how meaningful that moment had been for the family. It is incredible to share such intimacy with people whom we do not know,” said Trupia.
The baritone acknowledged that he is “terrified of death” since he spent a long time in hospitals as a child and that is why the “Music for the Soul” project has touched him deeply on a personal level.
“You realize that you can do many things if you take on an active role where the suffering is taking place. To see a 3-year-old undergoing chemotherapy is very hard. Nonetheless, you can be there, singing a song to him or her, and that teaches us so much,” he said.
Psychologist Daniel Merino celebrates the music for the soul concept.
“I think it is a very good project, because the soul can also be cured with music, and it is very important to bring music to people who are hospitalized. We are constantly working with the part of the patient that is ill, but this music is addressed at the healthy part, and it is extremely important in the healing process,” he said.
In the waiting room, many of the audience join soloist tenor Duilio Smirigila as he sings “O Sole Mio.” As the song wraps up the event, thunderous applause echoes through the hospital corridors.
Peruvian patient Omar remains seated, with a smile on his face after the concert.
He seems hesitant to speak, as if not to break the spell. “I am so moved by this,” he said. “This is a treasure. You don’t need material things. You need this. Something that can make you want to live longer.”