Abu Dhabi Festival investigates the healing power of music with hospital recitals

When Mohammed Al Awadi picked up his guitar in Al Ain’s Tawam Hospital on Tuesday last week and began playing some of his original compositions, he didn’t exactly feel comfortable.

“It’s a strange place to play music, in a hospital. I didn’t know how the audience would react,” said the 21-year-old Emirati, who is studying chemical engineering at the Higher Colleges of Technology in Abu Dhabi.

He needn’t have worried. As his music drifted down hallways, doctors, hospital staff and families all stopped to listen.

“People seemed moved, but I wanted to reach the patients themselves, to brighten up their days,” he says. “I think the patients are stuck in their rooms, concerned with their own worries, not as interested in what is going on around them.”

Still, he did feel he made an impact. He had chosen calmer compositions to play, and even performed a rendition of Metallica’s Nothing Else Matters on his guitar, to gauge the reaction of his audience.

“People just seemed to like the music. It was different, and unexpected,” he says.

Original article by Hala Khalaf

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Abu Dhabi Festival investigates the healing power of music with hospital recitals