Calvià Daily

Sunday 29^th January 2017

The Llar de majors de Calvià (Senior Citizens Home of Calvià) begins its journey through music therapy, through its psychosocial department composed of a psychologist and a sociocultural worker.

Music has the power to alleviate psychological and physical factors in people suffering from dementia, stress, anxiety, depression, schizophrenia, alzheimer, amongst others.

Music therapy aims to: generate positive emotions by evoking memories through songs; foster cognitive capacities such as attention, concentration, language and reasoning, trying to memorise part of the song; and exercise coordination, joint mobility, musculature and motor skills including the use of different musical instruments.

Music therapy sessions are held twice a week for one hour in groups of six to eight residents. There is varied music adapted to the profile of the users of the workshop: folk songs, Christmas carols, rancheras, folklore, Majorcan traditional dancing, etc. Part of the song is memorised from: humming, repetition of songs, a cappella, clapping hands, whistles. When this first part is consolidated they use different musical instruments (triangle, tambourine, xylophone, maracas ...) and then they try to integrate the sounds with the song learned. Attending the management of Attention Focused on the Person, it is the users themselves who choose which songs they like and which instrument they want to play.

Isolation, common in older people, can become a spiral that results in both deep sadness and illness. The activities and workshops of the Llar de Calvià always have as transversal axis the integration of people both in a particular group and in society. This feeling of belonging has a reassuring and protective effect on residents.

The results of the first sessions of music therapy have been satisfactory, the activity has been very well received amongst the residents.