Music Therapy Helps Memory & Alzheimer’s Patients – Alive Inside Movie

The following video clips are from a movie called Alive Inside that investigates the power of music therapy and its ability to help people with Alzheimer’s and dementia. It explores how music from a person’s past can help unlock memories that have been locked away for many years. Together with Oliver Sacks, the movie investigates how music functions in, and affects, our brains and our lives.

Man in Nursing Home Reacts to Music

If you prefer, you can read the transcript here.

Story of Henry

This is another excerpt from Alive Inside and the Music and Memory project. You can read the transcript here.

About the Alive Inside Movie

Alzheimer’s and dementia are a reality for an increasing and often unseen population. Though well-intentioned, many nursing homes are not equipped to fully meet the needs of these residents. We are left with several questions without any real or comforting answers: How do I want to age? What can we do for our loved ones? Can we do better?

Alive Inside investigates these questions and the power music has to awaken deeply locked memories. The film follows Dan Cohen, a social worker, who decides on a whim to bring iPods to a nursing home. To his and the staff’s surprise many residents suffering from memory loss seem to “awaken” when they are able to listen to music from their past. With great excitement, Dan turns to renowned neurologist Dr. Oliver Sacks, and we follow them both as we investigate the mysterious way music functions inside our brains and our lives.

Website: http://www.ximotionmedia.com/the-film/

Transcript: Man in Nursing Home Reacts to Music

Yvonne Russell:
I have one resident that barely opens her eyes. She didn’t respond. As much as I tried…I’ve known her for two years. No matter what I tried, massage wouldn’t work; nothing worked. But when we got introduced to the iPods, and the family told me the things that she liked, it was amazing once we put the iPod on her. She started shaking her feet, started moving her head. Her son was just amazed. Okay. Can we stop? Now, I’m getting all…I’m seeing her all over again.

Gerry:
Hi, poppa! Hi, poppa!

Henry:
Huh?

Gerry:
How are you doing?

Henry:
I’m all right. I’m fine. I’m great.

Gerry:
Who am I?

Henry:
Wait a minute. I don’t know.

Gerry:
Okay. It’s Gerry.

How long has he been in the nursing home? Approximately ten years. He was having seizures, and my mother couldn’t handle him at all. Of course, it affected me greatly because he was always fun-loving, singing. Every occasion, he would come out with a song, no matter where he was. I remember, as a child, he used to walk us down the street, me and my brother, and he would stop and do singing in the rain. He would have us jumping and swinging around poles. He was good. He was always into music, always loved singing, dancing.

Nurse:
His name is Henry Drea [phonetic]. And I’m looking, more or less, for religious music for him.

Male:
Okay.

Nurse:
Because he enjoys music, and he’s always quoting the Bible, so I’d rather have that for him.

Dr. Oliver Sacks:
We first see Henry inert, maybe depressed, unresponsive and almost un-alive.

Nurse:
Henry!

Henry:
Yeah?

Nurse:
Henry.

Henry:
Yes, doll?

Nurse:
I found your music. You want … you want your music now?

Henry:
Let me … maybe.

Nurse:
Let’s try your music, okay, and then you tell me if it’s too loud.

Dr. Oliver Sacks:
Then he is given an iPod containing, we know, his favorite music.
[Singing]
And immediately, he lights up. His face assumes expression. His eyes open wide. He starts to sing and to rock and to move his arms. And he is being animated by the music.

Nurse:
And he always used to sit on the unit, with his head like this. He didn’t really talk to much people. Then when I introduced the music to him, this is his reaction ever since.
[Singing]

Dr. Oliver Sacks:
The philosopher, Kent, once called music the quickening art, and Henry is being quickened. He is being brought to life.

Henry:
Yeah.

Nurse:
I’m going to take the music for one second, okay?

Henry:
Huh?

Nurse:
Just to ask you a few questions, okay? I’m going to give it back to you.

Henry:
Mm-hmm.

Nurse:
Okay.

Dr. Oliver Sacks:
The effect of this doesn’t stop because when the headphones are taken off, Henry, normally mute and virtually unable to answer the simplest yes or no questions, is quite voluble.

Male Speaker:
Henry?

Henry:
Yeah?

Male:
Do you like the iPod? Do you like the music you’re hearing?

Henry:
Yes.

Male:
Tell me about your music?

Henry:
Well, I don’t … I don’t have none, I mean.

Dr. Oliver Sacks:
Ask yes or no questions.

Male:
Do you like music?

Henry:
I’m crazy about music. You played beautiful music; beautiful sound, beautiful.

Male:
Did you play music when you were a … did you like music when you were young?

Henry:
Yes. Yes, I went to big dances and things.

Male:
What was your favorite music when you were young?

Henry:
I guess Cab Calloway was my number one guy. I liked [singing].

Male:
What’s your favorite Cab Calloway song?

Henry:
Oh, I’ll be home for Christmas. You can count…plan on me. With plenty of snow, mistletoe, presents wrapped around your tree, oww.

Dr. Oliver Sacks:
So, in some sense, Henry is restored to himself. He has remembered who he is, and he has
reacquired his identity for awhile, through the power of music.

Male:
What does music do to you?

Henry:
It gives me the feeling of love, romance, I figure right now the world needs to come into music, singing. You got beautiful music here, beautiful, oh, lovely. And I feel a band of love, of dreams. The Lord came to me and made me holy. I’m a holy man. So he gave me these sounds. He’ll just say, I’ll meet you. Let me see, Rosalie, don’t you love me; Rosalie, don’t you leave, sweet and dying.

Dr. Oliver Sacks:
With this beautiful new technology, we can have all the music which is significant for you on something as big as a matchbox or whatever, and I think this may be very, very important in helping to animate, organize and bring a sense of identity back to people who are out of it, otherwise. Music will bring them back into it, into their own personhood, their own memories, their own autobiographies.

[Music playing]

Transcript: The Story of Henry

Yvonne Russell:
When I first met him, he was very isolated.

Patient:
When someone first comes into a nursing home, they start to feel very disconnected from their lives, from who they’ve always been.

Patient:
If you can imagine someone who hasn’t recognized their loved one in five or six years.

Patient:
You know, I’ve been strong for four years; I just can’t take it anymore.
[Music plays]

Dr. Oliver Sacks:
Music can do things, which language can’t.

Male:
When I learned that maybe more than 90 percent of a resident’s time is spent idle, let’s try
this and see what difference the iPods could make.

Yvonne Russell:
I have one resident that barely opened her eyes; she didn’t respond; nothing worked. It was amazing once we put the iPod on her. She started shaking her feet, getting [inaudible]. I’m seeing her all over again.

Nurse:
I’m going to take the music for one second, okay, just to ask you a few questions. Okay?

Henry:
This or no questions.

Male:
What does music do to you?

Patient 2:
Give me a feeling of love, romance. I figure right now, the world needs to come into music, singing, dancing. You got beautiful music here, beautiful, oh, lovely. I feel a band of love, of dreams.

Dr. Oliver Sacks:
Music therapy with Alzheimer patients is something very powerful and primal is at work.

Henry:
This iPod keeps me happy. It keeps me from crying. And when I am upset, all I have to do is take out my music, and it soothes my nerves. And I go fast asleep.

Henry:
And we, at an average cost of about 80 dollars, this is less than most people’s daily medication costs. In terms of what difference it makes for the quality of life for an individual who is able to receive this, is just immeasurable. So for me, I can’t think of any greater value.
[Music plays]