The pianist who plays music for the blind elephant

Ampan is 80 years old and lives with us as Elephants World in Thailand. She is blind in one eye and can barely see with the other. 80 years old is very old indeed for an elephant, it’s about 10 years past the natural life span of an elephant in the wild.

In an interview, pianist Barton says all animals like music. Dogs, cats, etc. But elephants are the closest to human beings in the sense that they have the same neurons in the brains as us. Also they have a very good memory. If you are treated badly as a child, you are going to remember that all your life. It’s the same with elephants. The elephant shares that part of the brain with us which has flashbacks. They can never forget the terrible things they have seen and suffered.

In view of this, Paul Barton has embarked on a project to play music on his piano to soothe elephants in a way that it makes them forget their pain.

Pianist Paul Barton plays Debussy’s “Clair de Lune” for a gentle female elephant called Ampan.

If you play classical music to an elephant, something soft and beautiful, something that human beings have been listening to for hundreds for hundreds of years, something that is timeless- and you play that to an elephant that is blind and they’ve never heard music before- the reaction is priceless. There is a special bond between you and the elephant. You are communicating with them in a different language. That language is neither our nor theirs.

When asked “You insisted on moving the piano all the way up the mountain yourself. You are fifty and you said you suffer from back problems. What was the intention behind this difficult undertaking? Barton replied, the elephant has worked for humans for too long. It was used in wars, it was used to deforest its own home. What is the little thing I can do as a human to say sorry, for my species for what we have done to them? I’ll carry this heavy thing myself and play some music for the elephant while it is having some breakfast.