Research shows the best work out for your brain is listening to music. Johns Hopkins Medicine reports music can reduce anxiety, blood pressure, pain, improve sleep and more.
But for our aging community in the US, creating music is proving to be beneficial, too.
Twice a month, Peggy Miscigna brings her husband, Thomas, to Forgetful Friends choir rehearsals. Like Thomas, most members here struggle with dementia or Alzheimer’s.
"Just to see him with the chorus, you wouldn't know that he has Alzheimer’s,” Peggy says.
Like Peggy, Peter Knudsen is a spouse, as well as and a full-time caregiver.
"I try to keep her moving every day, and the music just adds to that,” Knudsen says. “It really helps to enhance that."
This unique choir is one of about 70 others just like it across the country.
Janice Priest is part of the Alzheimer’s Association and helped to start Forgetful Friends. She says music and singing does wonders for the brain and memory for people with dementia.
“People would be amazed. They would know the words, that they would be able to sing,” she says.
That's why people like Peggy and Thomas come to sing. They say it helps strengthen their mind and memory.
