‘I call it singing for the soul. It allows me to meet other people with dementia, which makes me feel that I am not so different after all.’ Irene lives with dementia and attends Singing for the Brain, a nationwide project started and organised by the Alzheimer's Society – the UK charity that campaigns for change, funds research to find a cure for dementia, and supports those living with it.
Singing for the Brain found life in 2003 with Chreanne Montgomery-Smith, after she experienced first-hand the positive impact of singing on people with dementia in the care home where she worked. ‘I started doing a range of activities,’ she says. ‘One of them was a quiz game, which involved playing familiar tunes. In the first week nobody sang; in the second a few people joined in. By the third, everyone was singing. One woman sang so much, she knew every song in the quiz – she felt very proud, and she was someone who didn't know her own name.’
After leaving the care home and joining the Alzheimer's Society, Montgomery-Smith was eager to further develop these activities, and a local singing group was set up in West Berkshire. Singing for the Brain was born.
‘There are now over 200 groups across England, Wales and Northern Ireland.’ Tim McLachlan is the operations director of national and local services for the Alzheimer's Society. This is hugely important because, as he points out, ‘someone develops dementia every three minutes in the UK and there's currently no cure.’ This makes the availability of support resources essential.
As the person responsible for the society's frontline help for those living with dementia, he oversees the establishment and management of outreach services within the charity. ‘As well as our individual services I am responsible for all of our group support services, including our Dementia Cafes and Singing for the Brain. These are designed to help improve confidence and motivation, provide reassurance and enable people affected by dementia to get the advice and information they need.’
Specific benefits
So why singing? ‘When you do a brain scan of someone listening to music there is widespread activity across both hemispheres,’ McLachlan says. ‘This indicates that we have a complex relationship with music and are indeed very musical creatures – from birth we hear the rhythm of our mother's heartbeat. The ability to sing lasts longer than the ability to speak; this is because regions of the brain associated with music memory overlap with regions relatively spared in Alzheimer's disease.
‘Music can also help with the recall of information for those with dementia, such as memories associated with favourite songs. These musical memories underpin the enjoyment and connections that people feel when they listen to familiar songs or tracks.’
In 2017, McLachlan represented the Alzheimer's Society on the Commission on Dementia and Music, run by the International Longevity Centre and the Utley Foundation. The commission found that there was no form of musical intervention was more efficacious than any other, and its principal recommendation was for widening and deepening access to musical activities for those with dementia.
As part of the commission, a number of studies and experiences were reviewed. McLachlan tells me that findings showed that music ‘helps to minimise the behavioural and psychological symptoms of dementia, tackles anxiety and depression, retains speech and language, enhances quality of life, and impacts palliative and end-of-life care’.
He says: ‘A musical activity such as Singing for the Brain has multiple health and wellbeing benefits for those with dementia as well as their carers. The group setting facilitates a sense of belonging and provides much-needed social support and enhanced relationships.’
Singing for the Brain sessions, which are free to attend, welcome people from any walk of life, regardless of the stage of the dementia they are living with. Groups are led by trained singing leaders who teach songs from scratch at a pace that is inclusive of everyone. The groups are held regularly – every week or fortnight – and last for around two hours, beginning with a half hour of relaxed time during which they can talk to one another and have refreshments.
‘The group activity involves a musician as well as the participants and their caregivers,’ says McLachlan. ‘During the session, they will gather in a large circle and follow instructions from the musician. Each singing session starts with warm-up exercises, which include song lyrics. All kinds of songs are used in the sessions, and there are also percussion instruments that people can play. Singing for the Brain promotes trying out new pieces of music to challenge and enhance skills – but familiar and well-known songs play an important part in group engagement.’
Positive outcomes
And it works. McLachlan tells me that 100 percent of people who attend Singing for the Brain sessions say that their lives have improved in some way. He is also keen to raise some brilliant and emotive feedback from attendees, such as that of Irene, at the beginning of this article. From John, who lives with dementia: ‘It gives you so much fun and pleasure.’ And from Sheila, daughter of Mary, who also lives with dementia: ‘It is a high point in the week – and it's amazing how the music brings out the “old mum”. She always leaves very happy.’ The wife of a 62-year-old man living with dementia said: ‘Music is now the one thing I can share with him that seems to give him pleasure.’
Recently, BBC One produced and aired Our Dementia Choir, a two-part documentary that was hosted by actress Vicky McClure of Line of Duty fame. Her own grandmother was diagnosed with vascular dementia at the age of 75 and lived with the disease until her death. ‘Together with specialists from the fields of medicine, music therapy and performance, McClure formed a special choir of 20 signers who are living with dementia,’ McLachlan says. ‘In the second episode we saw them come together to deliver an amazing performance to 2,000 in Nottingham.’
As a Singing for the Brain group leader in Nottingham, Angela O’Neill worked with McClure on the filming of Our Dementia Choir. One of the standout things O’Neill remembers about the choir was how the participants – 20 people who previously had not met – bonded as a group. She remembers a quote that was used in the production of the documentary: ‘Where words fail, music speaks’.
