VENUS MAHER
DYING
TO LISTEN
indicated that hearing is one of
the last senses to be lost.
“Our culture is coming to a great
awareness of the role of song and
music when it comes to pain, death
and grief,” says Joy Berger, who
teaches in the music therapy program at the University of Louisville
and is the director of education for
Hospice Education Network.
Diana Sebzda, the director of
bereavement at the Karen Ann
Quinlan Hospice in Newton, N.J.,
says she has often seen music
used for terminally ill patients.
It seems “to bring about a sense
of peace to the dying by calming
down their terminal restlessness
and for the family bedside,” she
says. “Often, the hospice team
will request the music continue to
play, even after the loved one has
died, because it helps create an
emotional environment to respect
the transition period of the loved
one who died.”
But deathbed songs can also go
wrong. Research is still being done
on how music affects the dying,
says Berger. “Especially if the musicians are not clinically trained
music therapists, assumptions
and mis-uses of music can occur
with ... what music is selected,
and outcomes to expect.”
HUFFINGTON
05.19.13
“Music should never be imposed upon another, but rather
should be empowering with and
for the dying person. And, the
same power of music to engage
one’s emotions, memories, and
memories can ignite overwhelming pain,” Berger says.
Some of the most traditional
or least-equipped hospitals and
hospices still don’t have musictherapy programs, let alone a relationship with bedside singers.
And the cooperation and interest
among medical staff varies when
it comes to Threshold, though
personnel are typically asked to
listen in and the choirs’ songbooks include appreciation songs
Kate Munger
founded the
Threshold
Choir
organization
in 2001 in El
Cerrito, Calif.,
and teaches
workshops
nationally
about how to
sing to the ill
and dying.