Medicine Focus 2017-2018. p 16

For almost three decades, I Medici di McGill has been celebrating the relationship between music and medicine. “The happiest moments of my childhood were playing music,” says founder Dr. Ante L. Padjen, Associate Professor, Department of Pharmacology & Therapeutics, who was inspired by a multigenerational orchestra that has existed since the 19th century in his native Croatia. “Music is pre-wired in the brain, this is no longer a hypothesis.” These non-professional musicians are selected mostly, though not exclusively, from McGill Faculty of Medicine faculty and students. In recent years, the orchestra has entertained hospital patients, funded lecture series and provided musical education to underserved communities such as PointeSaint-Charles. It has also filled NotreDame Basilica with an audience of 700 people, and raised $40,000 for Syrian refugees at a concert attended by Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre. In April 2016, I Medici held a benefit, under the directorship of Maestro Gilles Auger, for the Quebec Parkinson Network, and, at press time, plans are underway for another in support of the Cedars Cancer Foundation. (Juliet Waters)