When words fail, music speaks for us

There are moments in dementia care that can feel almost like a door opening.

A familiar song begins to play. Someone who has been quiet starts tapping a foot. A few words of a chorus emerge. A smile appears. Perhaps a story follows about a childhood home, a wedding, a parent, or a song once heard on the radio.

For families living with Alzheimer's disease and related dementias, moments like these can be powerful. They are also helping researchers better understand the remarkable relationship between music, memory, emotion, and connection.

Research suggests that our relationship with music can remain surprisingly resilient even as other cognitive abilities change. A systematic review published in WIREs Cognitive Science (https://wires.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/19395086) examined that music evoked autobiographical memories in several clinical populations and found that familiar music can evoke personal memories in people living with Alzheimer's disease. In fact, music evoked autobiographical memories appeared to be relatively well preserved in people with Alzheimer's compared with some other forms of memory retrieval.

Other research has found that familiar music can evoke autobiographical memories in people with mild to moderate Alzheimer's and suggests that musical memories and their associated emotions may remain accessible in ways that can support communication and social connection. The Alzheimer's Association notes that even in later stages of Alzheimer's, when verbal communication has become difficult, a person may still be able to tap along with a beat or sing lyrics from a song learned many years before. Music can provide another avenue for engagement and connection when words become harder to find.

It is important not to overstate what science tells us. Music does not restore memories that have been lost, nor does it reverse Alzheimer's disease. The latest Cochrane review of 30 studies involving 1,720 people with dementia found that music-based therapeutic interventions probably provide a modest improvement in depressive symptoms and may improve some behavioral outcomes. Researchers found less certain evidence for other outcomes and did not find evidence that music therapy improves cognition itself.

But cognition is not the only thing that matters.

Connection matters. Joy matters. Identity matters. Being able to participate in something meaningful matters.

That understanding is at the heart of Alzheimer's Resource Alaska's Forget Me Not Chorus.

From 30 voices to a growing community

In 2019, ARA launched the chorus in Anchorage under its original name, Voices of the Last Frontier, using the model developed by the Giving Voice Chorus Initiative. The pilot brought together about 30 people living with dementia and their care partners for seven weeks of rehearsals before their first concert at the Wilda Marston Theatre in the Loussac Library.

The project was made possible in part by a $12,000 contribution from 100+ Women Who Care. The idea was simple but powerful: rather than focusing on what dementia takes away, create a place centered on what people can still do together. Today, renamed the Forget Me Not Chorus, the program brings together Alaskans living with Alzheimer's and related dementias, care partners, family members, community volunteers, and musicians. What began with roughly 30 singers has grown into gatherings with more than 50 people participating, singing familiar songs, laughing, sharing stories, and building friendships. Recent seasons have included seven week rehearsal sessions followed by community concerts, and the chorus has expanded its reach through special performances and community partnerships.

This October, that journey will reach its biggest stage yet.

One Voice, Many Lifetimes

On Sunday, October 18, at 4 p.m., Alzheimer's Resource Alaska and Keys to Life will present One Voice, Many Lifetimes at the Discovery Theatre at the Alaska Performing Arts Center.

For the first time in Anchorage, this extraordinary intergenerational performance will bring elementary, middle, and high school students onto one stage alongside Alaskans living with Alzheimer's and related dementias.

Young voices and older voices. People whose memories are just beginning to form and people whose relationship with memory is changing. All of them connected through music.

Students from elementary and middle schools and Bettye Davis East Anchorage High School will join members of the Forget Me Not Chorus to perform familiar favorites and inspiring new songs centered on hope, resilience, and possibility.

What makes the concert especially meaningful is that it is about much more than a performance. Dementia can sometimes separate people from the broader community. Age can separate generations. Differences in culture,

income, religion, background, and life experience can make our worlds seem farther apart.

Music gives us common ground.

For an afternoon, students will not simply be performing for people living with dementia. They will be performing with them. The audience will see people of different ages and experiences contributing to the same song, each voice important to the whole.

That is a message we hope extends well beyond the walls of the theater.

A diagnosis of Alzheimer's does not erase a person's ability to contribute, experience joy, build relationships, or belong to a community. Sometimes connection simply requires us to find another language.

And sometimes that language is music.

The Forget Me Not Chorus has shown us this again and again. A song begins. Voices join together. The distinctions between the person living with dementia, the caregiver, the volunteer, the student, and the musician become less important.

What remains is a room full of people singing.

This October, we invite the Anchorage community to come listen. Because while memories may change and words may become harder to find, music can continue to offer something deeply human: a way to recognize one another, to share a moment, and to belong.

Lisa Sauder is the CEO of Alzheimer's Resource of Alaska.