Apprenticeship

Dancing in Hospital Corridors

‘Jim knew that he wasn’t much of a singer or dancer, and to him, a public display of singing and dancing implied he thought himself and expert. The villagers just stared at Jim and said, “What do you mean you don’t sing?! You talk!” Jim told me later, “It was as odd to them as if I had told them that I couldn’t walk or dance, even though I have both my legs.” Singing and dancing were a natural activity in everybody’s lives, seamlessly integrated and involving everyone. The Sesotho verb for singing (ho bina), as in many of the world’s languages, also means to dance; there is no distinction, since it is assumed that singing involves bodily movement.’

This Is Your Brain On Music – Daniel Levitin 2006

To some people, making music is an activity reserved for the elite. This is no more apparent than in the UK’s concert halls, with their ritual flower bouquets and coughing breaks. This is the same for dance, an art form most commonly seen at the wedding disco. So where does that leave us, stone cold sober in the harshly clinical environment of a hospital corridor, bobbing up and down in time to ‘Wind The Bobbin Up’?

I love dancing. As a child my role in my parent’s band was to be the first on the dance-floor and to encourage others to join me. Im still doing that now! I’ve pogoed and shuffled and bopped and moshed and salsa danced to all kinds of music and I hope I always will. However, most of my dancing has been with others doing the same thing in a dimly lit venue. Using movement in my music in healthcare practice has been a relatively new exploration for me. Its important to recognise that the young people we’re working with are often dancing, and we should positively reinforce this engagement with our music.

I do this sometimes by mimicking the movement of a young person, and sometimes by responding to their movement with music too. An example of this happened in a corridor, with a young person en route somewhere with his mother. He boogied along to the music we were playing in the adjacent ward, and his mum stopped and the both stood and watched. I turned away from the ward and noticed them. The child started, slowly at first bobbing up and down with the music. I joined in, naturally! This lasted for a minute or so. The music came to a natural conclusion, and I started improvising gently around a G chord, just to keep the music and dancing going. The rest of the musicians started to join in, not only with the music but with the movement too. Dave then led us into ‘Round and Round the Village’, an English Childrens song, and we all marched!

I think this highlighted the point to me that we are only embarrassed about dancing because we are told to be, and often children are yet to feel that embarrassment. I am now as confident in using movement in the hospital ward as I am singing and playing, and I feel that it is becoming an integral part of my practice. Its useful for making people laugh, making people dance and keeping people engaged; definitely not something to be embarrased about! Perhaps we all need a little more ‘Ho Bina’ in our day to day lives?

James and I had been playing for a while with B (a boy of around 5 with Down’s), who had been enthusiastically playing on the xylophone. We played through a song and brought it to an end, and B carried on playing, so we picked up his tempo and played chords along to him until another piece of repertoire emerged and we played that through, B focussed intently all the while on his playing. There came a point where B very clearly stopped and gave the beaters to his mum, who remarked how impressed she was that we were able to play in such a way that made B the musician and us his accompanists, and that we played something really good that he was taking a leading part in. This felt like a ringing endorsement, that what she described is EXACTLY what we’re aiming for.

Three of us had played to a whole bay, where I had offered a teenage lad with cerebral palsy a shaker – a bit tentatively as I was not sure if he would be able to hold it and I knew his motor control would be limited. His face, however, was such a beaming welcome of the music that it felt right. He did hold the shaker and was able to move it from side to side and played exactly on the rhythm. The song ended and he handed it back. The others said their goodbyes and made to go, but I was having a strong feeling that the lad could happily play more. I decided to go with that and, rather than be led by the others, said we could do more and went back to him with the xylophone. He struggled a little with the beater (we need a thick-handled one!) but clearly enjoyed being able to make sounds as Rich played and we sang along, and his brother came along and helped him with it. Meanwhile, across the bay, Sarah had engaged a mother and child in more play with the glock. It seemed very much the right thing that I had followed my instinct there and gone back to him, and the others agreed. At this point in the apprenticeship (very few sessions left) I’m pleased to be taking a lead in this way.