Galway Music Residency work with a broad variety of musicians including the captivating ConTempo Quartet and the award-winning trad band Galvian Way. A consultation was carried out with the facilities to help choose the right genre of music for each location. Resource packs were also created and distributed to the residents to give them a better understanding of the music and instruments used.

The feedback from residents in the care facilities was resoundingly positive. Residents were quick to engage with some performing with the groups, others waltzing and others moving and singing along with the music. In interviews with the residents in response to the initiative, we heard:

"“Absolutely gorgeous. I love it”, “I’m not able to sing but I was singing along all the same!” and in relation to the resource packs provided to the residents: “I was just reading there about the different instruments and that, it’s very interesting. It’s very informative and even there’s words of a few songs there.” "

The last performance in this series coincided with the facility’s Christmas jumper day. Residents enjoyed singing along to Christmas Carols while being served mince pies by staff in full festive gear and opening gifts from the local school children. The performers were honoured to have the oldest lady in Ireland amongst the audience on that day as they shared in a wonderfully warm inter-generational experience.

This project reached over 400 audience members. The ongoing impact has been overwhelmingly positive as care facilities have requested repeat performances, to which Galway Music Residency have happily agreed. This project has highlighted the importance of music as a form of expression, creativity, and just plan fun in residential care facilities.

In this performance 96 year old Dympna honoured everyone with her beautiful rendition of ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’. Sadly Dympna passed away just 6 weeks after this video was recorded, but the footage is an incredible testament to the value of supporting Creativity in Older Years. Dympna’s family chose to play this recording as a fitting farewell at her funeral.

The music is performed by the Aengus Hackett Quartet. Aengus is on guitar. Paul O’Driscoll on bass, Sean Lennon on fiddle, and Bertrand Huvé on sax.