The Healing Power of Music

I believe in the healing power of music. I'm a singer. As long as I can remember, I've understood the way that singing sets my body to vibrating and puts me at one with the universe. But never have I been as aware as two weeks ago, gratefully singing with the Juneau Symphony the soaring melodies of the Verdi Requiem.

It was a moment I'd dreamed of for many years, to solo in that amazing work. But only a Creator full of divine imagination could have dreamt the journey that would lead me to it in the frontiers of Alaska. Imagine: after years of discipline and sacrifice developing a singing career -- to suddenly have my heart cracked open through the simultaneous fires of breast cancer and Guiseppi Verdi. Who knew?

There is a tendency to assume that, when facing a serious illness, one must strive for constant peace and contemplation. Although this is a great ideal, you know, sometimes you just feel lousy and you want to scream your fool head off! And that is Sacred too. I remember when, as a passionate teenager trapped in the banality of suburbia, the only place within my Judeo-Christian tradition that could adequately express my range of emotions were the Psalms, full of angst and so flat out human that I felt safe in them. It's that way with Verdi's Requiem: along with moments of complete beauty and transcendence, he gives us aggressive rhythms that express the more raw parts of our experience. His music – all great music – is not simply a lovely diversion. It is a physical Force in the world, capable of doing great good.

I've been through a few things physically – having borne two children, and raised five, broken my back (literally) as well as my heart, and am now entering the surreal journey of chemo-therapy. But so far nothing quite equals the experience I had on that Sunday afternoon, singing the "Libera Me": percussion reverberating in my bones, the breath of a hundred chorus members pouring into my back, the vibrations of each instrument rocking me forward like a great wind. Awake and alive, I flew on the combined desire of dozens of friends, colleagues and loved ones; at once privately and publicly at Peace.

Yes, I will undergo the rigors of my treatment, and like so many other, braver women before me have successfully done, will emerge stronger, more Real. But truth is: I've already been healed. For I believe this: no cancer cell could have possibly withstood the power of that moment we all shared. The rightness of that great music has re-aligned my being, and I'm good to go.

Joyce Parry-Moore