Choir Celebrates Cancer Survivorship Through Song

Having cancer, being treated for cancer and surviving cancer is a long on-going process. Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center music therapist Mary Kauffman decided for her Sylvester internship that she wanted a project that would be uplifting and provide satisfaction and joy to people with cancer or who had survived cancer. The result was the Sylvester Singers Survivorship Choir.

Says Kauffman: “The choir started with my internship project, and has blossomed. I wanted something to lift people’s spirits and help them have a positive attitude and realize that being sick is not the end of the world. Survivorship is a long road, and music helps people feel good by finding their voice.”

And find it they did. The choir is made up of cancer survivors, people still in treatment, and even caregivers that wanted to share this with their loved ones. Members are in their twenties, thirties, even eighties. Joyce Pole, one of the members, says: “Being part of this choir gives me an uplifting feeling, along with great satisfaction and joy.”

The choir lets survivors at different points in their treatment and recovery connect and feel a community with others who have experienced their journey and celebrate it in song.

Tags: cancer, surviving cancer, Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center, Sylvester Singers Survivorship Choir