There may not be many "Deadheads" over 65, but Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart did a gig for the elderly anyway.
Hart appeared before the Senate's Special Committee on Aging Thursday with a vision of octogenarian percussionists and a suggestion that the nation's nursing homes and senior centers come equipped with drums. And he was, well, dead serious.The drummer for the legendary band, whose fans stretch from the pre-pubescent to middle-aged boomers, was one of several musicians and medical experts to testify at a hearing on the therapeutic value of music to the aged and infirm.
"Our bodies are multidimensional rhythm machines with everything pulsing in synchrony," said Hart, who has written two books on drumming and rhythm. "As we age, however, these rhythms can fall out of synch. And then suddenly there is no more important or crucial issue than regaining that lost rhythm."
In a session that saw the normally staid Senate hearing room rock with music and singing from a variety of elderly and disabled performers, Hart advocated the ancient practice of "drumming circles" for the elderly as a tool for maintaining both mental and physical well-being.
Proponents of music therapy at the hearing said visions such as Hart's may well enhance and prolong life for the elderly and even offer a partial cure for diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's.
Dr. Oliver Sacks, a neurologist whose experiences with catatonic patients inspired the movie "Awakenings," said he had witnessed many patients with apparent paralysis or inability to speak respond to music by dancing or singing.
"Many elderly patients with strokes are aphasic - they have lost some of their ability to articulate or use words. But the words which were lost may come back with singing, and music therapy can sometimes help the patient to adopt a sing-song way of speaking."
Sacks showed a videotape of an elderly victim of Alzheimer's disease whose incoherent conversation and flat voice became clear and animated as she was prompted to sing a song, remembered word for word, from her youth.