Teen uses music to thrive despite cancer
Records songs, video between treatments
When Marko Dobre arrived home after six days of chemotherapy treatment at Morristown Medical Center, he quickly began making plans to shoot his next music video, despite lingering fatigue and nausea.
The 17-year-old high school senior has a short window of time between treatments. He wants to get some filming in before his fourth round of chemo later this month as he battles anaplastic large cell lymphoma, a rare form of non-Hodgkin lymphoma.
Not too many high schoolers have to face such challenges. Then again, not many high schoolers record their own songs, publish their own music videos and have ambitions as big as Marko’s.
“I’ve just always had a lot of energy to do things and, even with cancer, I’m still going to do the things I’ve always loved,” Marko said from his home where he lives with his parents and two younger brothers.
Cancer is uncommon among teenagers but when it does develop, it often comes at a crucial time in a young person’s life – putting a pause on everything from sports, hobbies and schoolwork to plans for the future.
Marko determined early on not to let that happen. He came down with coldlike symptoms in October that wouldn’t go away for weeks. He soon developed a lump on his neck “the size of a golf ball.” A biopsy revealed lymphoma.
“At first it was shocking,” Marko said. “Everybody just cried when we got the news. Then we were like, what do we have to do to get me better?”
Marko spent about six weeks at Morristown Medical Center receiving treatment, including over Thanksgiving and Christmas. His mom, Lillian, would stay with him during the day and his dad, Niksa, would spend the night. It was a trying time. He was incredibly lonely. And so Marko did what he does best: He wrote a song about it and posted it to his Instagram page.
“I’m not bulletproof,” he sings from his hospital bed. “I don’t know what to do. You’re dragging me down, down, down, down, down.”
Before he was sick, Marko’s schedule was a whirlwind. After a day of school, he worked a few hours at a jewelry store in Totowa, went back to school for soccer or lacrosse practice, and did homework. Then he would often head to the recording studio at night.
He always had a fondness for music with Adele, Selena Gomez and The Kid Laroi as his chief influences. When he was 14, Marko took birthday money he had saved up and booked time at 263 Studio in Totowa. An engineer or producer would lay down some beats and Marko would freestyle. But as his musical taste went from rap to pop, he began writing down lyrics and coming up with a melody to sing them over a rhythm.
“I pick a beat from a producer and it all starts forming in my head,” Marko said. “I go into the booth and keep recording until it’s perfect. You can tell when it’s the one, the perfect version. It’s just intuition.”
He has recorded 30 songs and has made seven music videos, most shot around New Jersey and New York. Of the three videos uploaded to YouTube, “Before You Go” has racked up the most views since its debut in August, closing in on 5,000.
With more songs to write and produce in his future, Marko looks forward to being out of the hospital. He has three more rounds of chemotherapy left over the next three months, which will keep him in the hospital for about a week each time.
“After that, hopefully, I’ll be better and ready to go back to a normal life,” Marko said.