Professor Catherine Crock Photo: Supplied / HUSH Foundation
Cath Crock is a medical doctor, but a lot of the medicine she dispenses these days comes in the form of music.
Professor Crock is the founder of Australia's Hush Foundation which for the past 25 years has been commissioning and recording music by Australian composers to pipe into the wards, waiting rooms and operating theatres of the nation's hospitals.
RNZ Concert host Bryan Crump spoke with Professor Crock about the foundation, its work and its future, and discovered her love of music goes right back to childhood when she learned the piano. Later, as a medical student, she took up the oboe.
But it's one thing to love classical music, another thing to bring it to work with you.
In 1998, Professor Crock was taking care of cancer patients at Melbourne's Royal Children's Hospital.
She could see that while hospitals are designed to heal, the need for a clean, sterile environment can undermine the healing process, not to mention all the machines that are beeping, whirring, or just putting out a constant stream of white noise.
Not always a healing environment. Photo: befunky.com
"I thought this is a very difficult environment for the families and for the children, and I sat down with some of the parents and I said, I can see you're going through a really difficult time, how could we help?"
She believed music could be the answer. The parents agreed.
The prescription came via a CD, played throughout the hospital. But not just any classical piece: Prof Crock wanted it written specially for the environment.
"I did try some existing music, but it could be quite variable. If you think about classical music there's highs and lows and different keys that sometimes didn't work, and we'd be part way through a piece and I'd think 'I wish I could turn that off'. And intellectually I really loved the idea... to custom make music that would really fulfil the brief."
She invited composers into the hospital's wards and theatres, introducing them to patients and families.
"You need to be immersed in the healthcare environment one way or another, because otherwise I don't think they can really understand what we're looking for."
The composers then write the music, which the Hush Foundation records and releases on its own Hush label.
So far, over 150 of them have signed up, and they music they've written has proven popular both inside and outside Australia's hospitals to the extent that Hush is now one of the country's most successful independent labels.
Turns out, what works in the children's ward can also work in the concert hall.
However, there are challenges ahead. When jokingly asked what she'd do if one of the big record labels offered to buy Hush out, Professor Crock replied she'd love someone to make an offer.
In these days of music streaming, revenue - which used to come from CD sales - is much harder to come by.
At one point, the Hush Foundation was making a profit from its CDs which it could then donate to hospitals. Now it relies on donations from others; the revenue it makes from streaming its music does not cover the costs.
But Professor Crock is optimistic.
"We've been talking to philanthropists who are interested in both healthcare and the arts, because this crossover between health and the arts I think is a very important one... now I think because we've become very well known, it's the opportunity for us to talk to people about getting some more support and be able to spread this even further."
