In addition to a shared love of music, The Broe Tabernacle Therapeutic Choir has another thing in common. All 19 members are singers who have had traumatic brain injuries and receive therapy at the Broe Rehabilitation Services in Farmington Hills. The choir was formed by its director, Len McCulloch, director of psychological services at Broe, who noticed clients often responded better to song than conversation. The seed was sewn when one client, who had never spoken a word since his traumatic brain injury occurred, began humming. With a little encouragement from McCulloch, he burst into a robust version of “Amazing Grace.”
The choir has performed at nursing homes, homeless shelters- even at a mother house for religious orders of nuns, who flattered choir members by asking for their autographs after the show.
In addition to a 45 minute performance by the choir, featuring such tunes as “Micheal Row the Boat Ashore,” “You Are My Sunshine,” and “He’s Got the Whole World In His Hands,” some choir members performed solos and gave a brief history of their injury.
Timothy Broe, Ph.D, talked about traumatic brain injury: prevention, drinking and driving, sports related concussions. There was also an informal question and answer period with choir members.
For the 150 North students who came to the optional presentation, the response was overwhelmingly positive.
“We gave them a form for feedback and the responses were phenomenal,” McCulloch said. “The ratings were all very impressive and they said Thank You for coming.”
“The entire presentation ran from 9 a.m. to 10:25 a.m.
For more information on Broe Choir, call Lem McCulloch at Broe Rehabilitation Services, 474-2763