News

Patients form rock and roll band in Hospice

10 February 2010

Hospice patients have come together to form a rock and roll group, performing to fellow patients and at an open day.

Guitarist Alan Spong, 65, and drummer Bob Bartholomew, 60, both cancer sufferers, formed the band after starting music therapy classes at the St Helena Hospice day centre in Clacton.

The pair are both talented musicians who have played in bands in the past, but had stopped after their diagnosis.

They formed the group, together with the hospice’s music therapist, Ruth Ellam, and chaplain, Mark Ambrose, has even joined them on bass.

The pair have named the group Day by Day. Mr Spong, of Kingsman Drive, Clacton, explained the name, saying: “We are taking it day by day – you never know what is round the corner.”

He had to relearn how to play the guitar after his treatment damaged the feeling in his hands, and said: “It felt like a part of my life was taken away when I could not play.”

Mr Bartholomew, of Stones Green, near Wix, had donated his drums to the hospice, thinking he had given up music for good.

The group played their first gig as a trio over Christmas and are now hoping to get another opportunity to perform and may even take place in a fundraiser for St Helena Hospice.

 

Colchester Gazette, 10/02/10