Singing cafe brings back happy memories
A VILLAGE cafe turns time machine every other week to offer music therapy to people living with dementia.
Proprietor Tanya Naidoo organises the two-hour sessions at her Hollows Farm Vintage Tea Rooms which are focused on tunes from “the good old days”.
Launched at the beginning of the year the sing-alongs are proving a hit with both dementia sufferers and their relatives and carers, who regularly report what a difference they make.
The venture comes as a recent study showed music can help reduce symptoms such as anxiety, agitation and aggression, as well as recollective function.
The research, which has been presented to the House of Lords, called for music therapy to be promoted by the NHS and for care homes to provide more musical opportunities dents.
Currently, the report said, only five per cent of care homes are using music therapy effectively.
Tanya, who started the free sessions through sheer altruism, has been struck by the affect the singsong sessions have on customers.
She said: “It is really special to me as the proprietor seeing my customers really enjoying themselves. One customer, Arthur White from Cosby, is nearly 91 and he dances around with his walking stick and knows every word of the songs we sing.
“He is such a character and is always making jokes and being mischievous. This I’m told is a complete contrast to how he is when he’s not at the singing sessions.”
Through Arthur’s family Tanya has learned a little more about his background. As a young lad he was a Bevin boy, men conscripted during the Second World War and just for resi- afterwards to work in the mines. Later he was a prison officer in Leicester.
Tanya said: “His family and the friends who bring him to my tearoom say he loves coming here and is so happy, secure and at peace with life when he’s here singing along and reliving the good old days.
“Arthur‘s friend Theresa also of Cosby who brings him to the tearoom says ‘He’s always on top form when he comes here.’”
Arthur himself has been full of praise for the singing cafe, saying: “The music takes you back you know. It doesn’t matter what mood you’re in when you walk in, it just lifts your spirits and you can’t help singing along.”
For more information check out Tanya’s Facebook page.
The research was commissioned by the International Longevity Centre thinktank and the Utley Foundation, a private family charitable trust.