Musicians Play Their Way Through Brain Surgery
Music has incredible power to calm, inspire, and challenge. It can help people achieve things they never thought were possible. And, for a musician, playing an instrument can be a supportive practice and lifelong passion.
Innovative surgical techniques are helping musicians stay connected to their instruments despite neurological diseases, according to Classic FM. In an inspiring breakthrough, a longtime clarinet player succeeded in playing her instrument with ease thanks to a life-changing operation.
Playing Clarinet in Surgery
Denise Bacon is a 65-year-old clarinetist, whose musical career was interrupted by a Parkinson’s diagnosis that robbed her of her fine motor abilities. “I used to play in the East Grinstead Concert Band,” Bacon told Classic FM. “And I had to stop around about lockdown, I remember I just couldn’t keep going and it was mainly because the fingers weren’t pressing,” she added.
Recently, Bacon underwent a four-hour-long brain surgery at King’s College Hospital in London, with the goal of relieving her symptoms. Professor Keyoumars Ashkan led the surgical team. The surgery involved wires being inserted into movement-related parts of Bacon’s brain as she lay awake on the table.
During the procedure itself, Bacon was encouraged to play her clarinet so the surgeons could assess the success of the procedure. “I remember my right hand being able to move with much more ease once the stimulation was applied, and this in turn improved my ability to play the clarinet, which I was delighted with,” she explained.
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A Violinist in the Operating Theater
This wasn’t Ashkan’s first time operating on a patient who played music live on an instrument dear to her heart, NBC reports. In 2020, Ashkan came up with a plan to surgically remove a brain tumor from 53-year-old violinist Dagmar Turner, also at King’s College Hospital.
Turner’s tumor was located close to a part of the brain that manages fine motor control in the left hand. “The violin is my passion; I’ve been playing since I was 10 years old,” she shared with NBC. “The thought of losing my ability to play was heartbreaking.”
Ashkan asked Turner to play the violin during the procedure, so his team could ensure that her ability to manipulate the instrument wouldn’t be affected by the surgery. Turner played pieces by composers Gustav Mahler, George Gershwin, and Julio Iglesias as the surgical team cut away at her brain. “This was the first time I’ve had a patient play an instrument,” said Ashkan. “We managed to remove over 90 percent of the tumor, including all the areas suspicious of aggressive activity, while retaining full function in her left hand.”
Together, these innovative and fascinating procedures reveal how carefully tailored neurological surgeries can make a meaningful difference for patients. For musicians, it can even mean holding on to the skills that matter most to them, both inside and outside the operating theater.
