Music Is Our Weapon - Music Discovery

Volunteers are paired with elder care residents based on the distributed Resident Questionnaire and sat comfortably in front of or behind each participating resident typically gathered in the activity room.

Using the Resident Music Questionnaire, volunteers are able to strike up conversation and speak to the resident with some insight. The volunteer refers to the questionnaire to determine what song/artist/album to start with and then applies the headphones to the resident and themselves both connected by an audio splitter in order to listen to the same music together.

Using Spotify the volunteer starts a radio station or sources a well curated playlist from the Music Is Our Weapon Spotify account and the music discovery process begins. As the songs stream through the playlists/radio we look for special reactions such as smiles, foot-tapping, nodding, singing etc. As we discover music that they like a list is made onto the Resident Music Questionnaire.

The goal by the end of the session is to expand on the suggestions given by the Resident Music Questionnaire and list as many songs/artists/albums possible for us to reference in the future as we create their personalized playlists. Upon completion of our allotted outing time we collect the devices, headphones and questionnaires.