The Score | Brass Speaks

This winter marked a decade since Gabby Giffords, the former U.S. Congress member from Arizona, was shot. She survived, but the gunshot wound to her left temporal lobe left her with aphasia, an inability to express written and spoken language. Giffords has received neurologic music therapy, which can help brain-injured individuals regain language by creating alternate pathways in the brain. And this spring, Giffords spoke publicly about how she has taken up playing the French horn again after many years as part of her regimen. Singing and playing a musical instrument have been widely cited by neuroscientists and music therapists who work with brain injury and disease as tools for regaining language for people suffering brain trauma, stroke, or other brain difficulties. A recent PBS Newshour segment described how Giffords’ preparation for a speech she delivered in August 2020 at the Democratic National Convention included sketching musical notation alongside the text of a speech, to help with her delivery. For Giffords, recovery is ongoing—and she says practices the horn five days a week.