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Music and Memory

Songs to share, sing and dance to: a global playlist for those with Alzheimer's

This week, the World Service marked World Alzheimer's Day with a ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Music and Memory project, exploring the power of music to reach sufferers with the disease. It launched a website of global tracks to trigger memories, compiled with the help of the ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½'s language services. Behzad Bolour compiled ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Persian's list, his father suffered from dementia, but still sang with him. He also explores Iran’s complex relationship with music.

But what tracks does the rest of the world dance and remember to? We hear from ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Arabic's Nahed Najjar, Adedayo Owolabi of ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Yoruba, Kateryna Khinkulova of ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Russian and Partha Prasad from the Indian languages hub in Delhi about some of the tracks they contributed to the world music database, and why.

Image: Elderly Indian lady listening on headphones looking at smartphone
Credit: ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½

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24 minutes

Podcast