07/15/2026
We're thrilled to announce our new music therapy partnership with Among Friends Adult Day Center and our longtime friends at Wyoming Dementia Care! Among Friends will be bringing group music therapy sessions to their families twice a week, sponsored by Wyoming Dementia Care. Our music therapy supervisor, Zane Rutledge, describes the benefits of music therapy for our aging populations and what they can expect to engage in during their weekly sessions.
Additionally, WyOGives, a yearly donation event for nonprofits across the state, opens tomorrow! If you're able, a donation to our friends at Wyoming Dementia Care or Mercer Family Resource Center helps provide not only music therapy services to the community through fiscal sponsorship, but also allows them to continue to serve their mission to the community through other avenues. You can search for both organizations at www.wyogives.org
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Music therapists have long watched a familiar song help individuals connect with the people and world around them while unearthing long-forgotten memories. All the while, the cognitive and emotional work taking place is presented simply as musical play and social interaction. This is the heart of VIBES’ music therapy program at Among Friends Adult Day Center serving individuals living with Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia.
Music has a unique relationship with the brain and memory. Language and memory fade as diseases like Alzheimer’s progress, but the brain’s ability to respond to music is typically preserved and often enhanced. Music therapists utilize this response to encourage movement, singing, and storytelling when previously these skills were inaccessible. In these moments, music serves as a bridge to identity, emotion, and memories of the past that were previously forgotten.
Music therapy in these settings is built around small-group sessions that use live singing, movement to music, and reminiscence to create successful experiences regardless of the progression of their disease. Music for each session is specially chosen to evoke strong feelings and memories of earlier years. Hymns, big band standards, folk songs, and childhood classics related to a client’s early adulthood are chosen because personally meaningful music produces the strongest and most reliable cognitive responses. Using music, the music therapists are able to leverage the heightened response to music to increase the lucidity, engagement, and recall of the patient.
The medical and mental health benefits extend well beyond an afternoon, and in most instances are shown to persist up to a week after the session. Research shows that music therapy for individuals with dementia can reduce anxiety and agitation, improve cognition and memory, and even encourage more effective verbal communication. Additionally, isolation proves to be a significant exacerbator of these symptoms. Using music intervention in a group setting helps to reduce this isolation by providing opportunities for socialization, intergroup validation, and collaborative music making. Perhaps most powerfully, music often opens a channel for emotional expression and connection with loved ones when words no longer come easily.
For families, this program offers a way to share an experience with someone they love, even as the disease progresses. For participants, it offers dignity, joy, and connection to the people and world around us. In these small, often playful moments, music therapists help people hold onto the parts of themselves that music refuses to let go of.
- Zane Rutledge
