{"id":25561,"date":"2018-03-27T10:20:31","date_gmt":"2018-03-27T09:20:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/?p=25561"},"modified":"2018-03-28T10:51:56","modified_gmt":"2018-03-28T09:51:56","slug":"retirement-villages-find-their-voice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/retirement-villages-find-their-voice\/","title":{"rendered":"Retirement villages find their voice"},"content":{"rendered":"

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JANE SLADE discovers retirement communities offering a new rhythm to later life<\/h3>\n

Judy Allen started learning the piano when she was six. By the age of 10 she was playing in her local church. After a career as a piano teacher and music examiner she is now, aged 82, playing the organ at Caldy Valley Church, a short walk from a retirement village near Chester where she moved seven years ago.<\/p>\n

Once a fortnight she also accompanies a singing group she co-founded at Grade II listed Boughton Hall, where she owns a two-bedroom apartment.<\/p>\n

Once a fortnight some 29 regulars gather round Judy\u2019s grand piano, which occupies a space in one of the communal areas for a good old sing song. \u201cWe have a repertoire of over 40 songs,\u201d Judy trills. \u201cWe sing a mixture of show tunes, popular tunes like Simon and Garfunkel and the Carpenters as well as hymns, and war songs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Music has been Judy\u2019s life and she is showing no signs of stopping \u2013 she even tutors at a summer school in Tonbridge. \u201cSinging a wonderful way of getting to know people, integrating and socialising,\u201d she adds.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s so good for mental health too. Two ladies joined us recently who had lost their husbands and one man who came for the first time said afterwards, \u2018I have just spent an hour not thinking once about my aches and pains.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Singing has been shown to release endorphins, reduce stress levels and, according to a report published in the Journal of Music Therapy, help cope with chronic pain. A joint study by Harvard and Yale Universities in 2008 even claimed that singing in a group can increase life expectancy.<\/p>\n

One of Judy\u2019s singing regulars Stan Fielding has just turned 100!<\/p>\n

Boughton Hall is part of the Enterprise Retiring Living group which is building two more retirement villages; The Red House in Ripon, Yorkshire comprising 59 apartments priced from \u00a3250,000, and Mount Battenhall in Worcester which has not yet begun construction.<\/p>\n

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Boughton Hall singing group<\/p><\/div>\n

Choirs and music groups are becoming standard features of retirement communities, and operators are nurturing this trend by providing pianos, rehearsal rooms and even performing spaces.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll our villages have a hall or large space for musical performances,\u201d says\u00a0Oscar Russell, Group Estates Director\u00a0of Retirement Villages\u2019 14 developments. \u201cMost villages have choirs, sometimes all female or male and sometimes mixed, while others even have a nightlife vibe with music from the decades, dancing and a bar.\u201d Owners at Castle Village near Berkhamstead in Hertfordshire have even formed a jazz club.<\/p>\n

James Cobb, sales and marketing director at Renaissance Villages, part of the Inspired Villages Group, adds:<\/p>\n

\u201cMusic is a passion for many people, including a lot of our residents. As operators of retirement villages, we strive to make peoples\u2019 lives as fulfilling as possible, and the grand pianos in many of our villages\u2019 clubhouses help to achieve this – a reflection of the passions of our residents.\u201d<\/p>\n

Retired musician Dorothy Moore, 80, has 14 members in her choir The St Elphin\u2019s Singers which she formed at Audley St Elphin\u2019s Park which occupies 14 acres in the Derbyshire Dales.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt started with a few people singing carols one Christmas to cheer up residents who didn\u2019t go out much,\u201d she explained. \u201cWe then did a concert and are now doing a cabaret night.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dorothy, a retired music therapist and teacher, even has room in her apartment for a piano and a cello. Music has been her life; she met her late husband when they played cello together in a local orchestra and were married for 56 years.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have a lovely spacious apartment with triple aspect windows and lovely views. I couldn\u2019t imagine music not being part of my life. I still get together with old friends from music college to do part singing. It gives so much enjoyment and brings people together. It also cheers me.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/div> JANE SLADE discovers retirement communities offering a new rhythm to later life Judy Allen started learning the piano when she was six. By the age of 10 she was playing in her local church. After a career as a piano teacher and music examiner she is now, aged 82, playing the organ at Caldy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":25563,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_analytify_skip_tracking":false,"cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_caption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_nocaption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_hide":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[11842,989,11845,11841,10575,10909,11843,10173,235,394,3174,395,262,6694,2218,9755,11844,3512,777,1661],"class_list":["post-25561","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifestyle"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-13 19:50:10","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category"},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25561","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25561"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25561\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25567,"href":"https:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25561\/revisions\/25567"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25563"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25561"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25561"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25561"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=25561"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}