Veterans at Brushwood Center at Ryerson Woods are using a multi-sensory approach to create music as a way to heal from the past.
Water(color) for the Soul: Music of Lake Michigan is a program for Veterans from the Captain James A. Lovell Federal Health Care Center and We Serve: Special Recreation Association for Central Lake County to create and perform their very own musical compositions.
Parker Nelson, musician and director of public programs and music at Brushwood Center, conceived of Water(color) for the Soul: Music of Lake Michigan, as a six-week music, art and poetry workshop beginning Friday, Jan. 10.
Guided by Black Moon Trio, a chamber music group also founded by Nelson, veteran participants create original music.
“Access to nature is often hard to come by, we want the Veteran participants to experience nature firsthand and use it as inspiration,” Nelson said.
Nelson says participants use graphic notation to compose music – a process of documenting musical ideas using abstract representations of sound such as color, shape, or gesture, allowing quicker access to the music-making process than traditional systems allow.
“This program seeks intersections between sound, poetry, and visual art, and helps our composers replicate the music they have in their head,” Nelson said.
Using resources from Brushwood Center’s At Ease and Art Supply Exchange programs, veterans will compose 20 original pieces of music to be performed by professional musicians on Feb. 14.
Black Moon Trio will be joined by world-renowned botanical artist, Heeyoung Kim and members of her Botanical Art Academy to showcase watercolor painting methods and techniques. Poet and creativity expert Kathryn Haydon also joins the team as her collection of poetry, Unsalted Blue Sunrise: Poems of Lake Michigan, provides the thematic framework for Veterans to compose works about their own connection to the freshwater resource.
Army veteran Beverly Rivera, from Berwyn, joined Friday’s program.
“These creative programs bring you closer to your inner-self, they help to ease anxiety and depression, allowing you to focus on the possibilities,” Rivera said.
Vietnam veteran Gary Andre, also participated on Friday.
“I love the poetry aspect and how it makes you aware of other perspectives and what you may have been missing,” Andre said.
Water(color) for the Soul: Music of Lake Michigan is part of Brushwood’s At Ease: Art and Nature for Veterans initiative — providing monthly programs to the Military Community through nature-based art, music, and community workshops,
generously funded by the National Endowment for the Arts’ Creative Forces initiative.
“At Brushwood, we believe in health equity, and in creating and providing these programs specifically for the population in most need, our veterans, so therefore these workshops are not open to the public,” Nelson said.
Army veteran, Joanna Rakowski from Northbrook also participated.
“These multidisciplinary activities offer veterans release, peace, and reconciliation to those suffering from PTSD and anxiety,” Rakowski said.
“The Brushwood Center especially anchors us to nature, a connection that helps to ease our struggle with the past,” Rakowski said.
Gina Grillo is a freelancer for Pioneer Press.
