Musical memory a powerful thing

It started eight months ago, when the karaoke machine broke.

To fill the musical void, Springfield’s Eaglewood Village placed a 911 call to Pat Day, a woman whose energy level makes her 80 seem like the new 30.

By the next day, Day had wrangled a box of previously owned copper colored gelatin molds from the St. Vincent DePaul Society.

Having previously led a band of seniors in the rhythmic striking of kitchenware, she named her latest group The Coppertones.

Eight were there at 2 p.m. that first Wednesday. Twenty were there last week.

Although most were from the Memory Unit, pleasantries were still exchanged:

“You know I never forget a face ... Hi, stranger ... Hi, neighbor.”

One woman, unable to speak, communicated her joy with a smile that spread slowly across her lips.

Volunteer pianist Donna Parks warmed up the band, asking, “Everybody ready to roll?”

And just before 2 p.m., Day swept in like a tsunami of joy.

“Hot diggity-dog!” she called out. “Lookie here! Lookie here!”

After forks and spoons made their first tentative taps on the metal molds, Parks launched into the chords of “Has Anybody Seen My Gal?”

Although the group was stronger on the chorus, some sang every word.

Things were going so well that at the end of “Let Me Call You Sweetheart,” Day cried out: “Bew-tee-full.”

The group then hit its stride in “76 Trombones,” clinking to the beat with the spirit of the Stanford Band at Mardi Gras or Dead Heads spinning like tops in tie-dye.

In years of volunteering, Parks has seen music draw seniors out of themselves.

While playing at Good Shepherd Village, Parks watched a woman who hadn’t spoken in months “started getting closer and closer” to the piano.

“Then she stared singing,” Parks said.

The woman’s children, who hadn’t heard her speak in months, began to cry.

The weekly gathering doesn’t eliminate the isolation of memory loss. Some Coppertones retreat to their rooms, never to speak until the next week.

But for a golden hour, Day said, the music reminds them “of when they were young and when they sang. It brings back memories.”