Filipino talent gives dose of good music, healing By Christian V. Esguerra Philippine Daily Inquirer First Posted 02:01:00 07/21/2008
MANILA, Philippines—Seventy-year-old Joanne Good was growing anxious.
Trapped in her hospital bed the past three months, the leukemia patient was looking forward to only one thing each day—a “jamming” session with her music therapist Rita “Rich” Antonia Abante.
“Where’s Rich?” Joanne asked her attending nurse at the Florida Hospital in Orlando.
“She’ll be arriving shortly,” the nurse told her restless patient.
Garbed in a white medical gown, Rich, 26, showed up as promised with her guitar, a song binder, and her familiar million-dollar smile. “Why don’t we try writing a song for today?” she asked.
Joanne got excited, her thoughts traveling back to a loved one she had not seen in a while. She began talking about Michelle, the first of her grandchildren and her favorite, the day she was born, and how she “changed me forever.”
The result of that day’s session would be “Michelle’s Song,” a sentimental collaboration between patient and therapist.
Joanne would pass away weeks later, but not after enjoying her final moments—and probably the best—in the company of Rich and her daily dose of good music and healing.
Rich, daughter of Manila Rep. Benny Abante, is a board-certified music therapist in the United States who graduated summa cum laude at the prestigious Berklee College of Music in Boston.
One of only three non-Americans in the highly competitive program, she topped it with a 3.89 GPA.
Rich’s field is relatively popular in the American medical circles, but is still largely unheard of in this part of the world.
Music therapy is “an established healthcare profession that uses music to address physical, emotional, cognitive, and social needs of individuals of all ages,” according to the American Music Therapy Association, of which Rich would soon be a member.
Promoting wellness
The association says it has a variety of applications, from promoting wellness, managing stress, alleviating pain, enhancing memory, or in Joanne’s case, reducing anxiety.
It wasn’t easy for an old woman to accept the gravity of her condition, more so the likelihood of death. Rich entered at this point in Joanne’s life. Rich was then an intern completing the penultimate phase of her Berklee education.
The student immediately showed promise, the stuff any music therapist should possess: musical talent, competence, patience and enduring compassion.
One mentor, who had seen Rich develop from a pure musical talent into a well-rounded music therapist, once told her way before her graduation: “You’re ready. You embody what any music therapist should be.”
Rich kept all this by heart the day she met—and “cracked”—Joanne.
“I knew she was anxious so I had to increase her relaxation,” Rich recalls in an interview with the Philippine Daily Inquirer (parent company of INQUIRER.net).
Walking jukebox
Rich made instant connection with Joanne when she found out that she, too, loved Christian music. Rich grew up with Christian music primarily because of her father, a senior pastor at the Metropolitan Bible Baptist Church.
Like a walking jukebox, Rich played “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” whose message was apt to the woman’s condition.
Joanne also liked folk music so Rich came up with her own rendition of James Taylor’s “How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You).” The ice had been broken.
Rich discovered music therapy during her sixth year as a voice major at the University of the Philippines’ College of Music in 2001. Already growing tired of her classical music discipline, she stumbled upon a lecture featuring a Cleveland-based music therapist.
“It struck me,” Rich says, recalling footage of the therapist visiting hospital rooms and facilitating music sessions with kids. “I told myself, ‘This is what I want to be.’”
Combining music, science
Rich had felt the field would be a fulfillment of her two inclinations—music and science. She had wanted to be a pediatrician, but gave in to her father’s wish that she pursue a career in music.
Her online search for a good music therapy school in the United States led her to Berklee. She got a partial scholarship after sending a cassette recording of her singing “Someone To Watch Over Me” while playing the piano. Her demo also included an aria.
Despite the scholarship, Rich says Berklee’s tuition of around $14,000 per semester then was still too much even for a Philippine congressman’s daughter.
Rich says she turned to her resourcefulness to get to Berklee in 2004. She worked part-time as her dormitory’s resident assistant, meaning “inspector.” She’d monitor fellow students who’d sneak in alcoholic drinks and other prohibited items in the dorm. The job covered 85 percent of her living cost.
Even so, she still had to keep her belt tight and survive on her $100 monthly allowance from her parents. This meant zero shopping until mom and dad had paid her a visit.
The relatively tough life didn’t keep her from leaving a mark in a highly competitive environment like Berklee. In a world where everybody knew music, her voice stood out.
On several occasions, Rich was the featured vocalist at the school’s “Singers’ Night,” a regular showcase of Berklee’s best. To be chosen would be to best a field of 130 singers each time.
Something special
In her March 2006 performance, Rich wowed the predominantly American crowd at the Berklee Performance Center with her jazzy rendition of Dina Bonnevie’s “Bakit Ba Ganyan?” The pianist-vocalist was backed by a 10-piece orchestra.
“Even if I didn’t understand a word in your song, I knew it was something special,” a member of the audience told Rich afterward.
Rich is just as appreciated for her music therapy.
“Rich’s gentleness and sensitivity to me as a patient was very appreciated during hospital stays,” patient Elizabeth Apel wrote in a compliment card. “The music ministered to me helped me get through some long days.”
Such was Joanne’s experience in the caring arms of her therapist. A nurse told Rich after the septuagenarian’s death: “If you only knew how much your work meant to her.”
Indeed, Rich struck a chord in Joanne especially with their joint composition, “Michelle’s Song,” summing up what meant most for the woman in her final days—her granddaughter.
“You’ll never know the happiness that you have brought to me,” the song goes. “Because you’re a part of me and I’m a part of you.”
Joanne, close friends know, could well be referring to her therapist as well.
Copyright 2008 Philippine Daily Inquirer. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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