Bright Ideas - Aug. 8, 2016

Music Program for Veterans Creates Community, Eliminates Isolation in Josephine County, Ore.

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Problem: Vietnam-era military veterans often feel alienated from society at large.

Solution: A music outreach program that unites them in a common purpose.

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It all started at a veterans’ art show in Josephine County, Ore. There wasn’t any music, so Lisa Pickart, the county’s veterans service officer, fetched a guitar from her car, came back and began to sing Down by the River.

When she was done, Bob Eaton, a Vietnam War combat veteran, borrowed Pickart’s guitar and launched into My Ol’ Nam Hat, a song he wrote about his and other Vietnam vets’ experiences of coming home to less than a hero’s welcome. 

“His voice just compelled you to listen to his story,” Pickart said recently. The encounter would inspire her to help create the county’s Veterans Music Outreach Program (VMOP). “Me and the director of the Vet Center, both of us were watching him, and we’re like, if we build it, they’re going to come.”

The program provides an outlet for veterans to perform together — for those with musical experience — and an opportunity for newcomers to learn. It costs about $5,000 per year to run, largely funded by the Oregon Department of Veterans Affairs, Pickart said. That helps to pay for a guitar teacher from a local music store, a keyboard, drums, books and “basic” recording equipment. Participants can also take voice lessons and learn how to write their own songs.

Veterans comprise about 10 percent of the southern Oregon county’s population.

VMOC, strictly speaking, isn’t a musical therapy program, which must be led by credentialed music therapists, Pickart said.

“We’re not music therapists; we never claim to be,” she added. “It’s just a recreational music group. But the therapeutic component of this group has been huge. It just had a ripple effect; none of us even saw it coming.”

The program began in 2011 with a handful of military veterans who met twice monthly. Before long, that number had grown to seven.

Today, about 20 veterans participate, and Pickart estimates that, all told, 40 to 50 people have been involved. As word spread and demand grew, the sessions expanded to four times a month.

But even word-of-mouth faced an uphill battle in engaging vets.

“The veterans would say they didn’t want to come; they hate being part of something with a bunch of people,” she explained of often-reclusive vets.

“But once they get there and start playing music, endorphins are released in your brain, and every time they leave, they leave happy; they were glad they came.”

Eaton, who was an Army sergeant during the Vietnam War, has said, “This program saves lives. Once I get here I don’t want to leave. It’s a safe environment and its fun.”

The more advanced group calls itself The DD214s, after Defense Department Form 214, a certificate of release or discharge from active duty.

The less experienced performers are The DD215s, after another document. In addition to guitarists, the groups include singers and percussion players.

“They’ve become kind of brothers, kind of musicians-in-arms, so to speak,” Pickart said. “And they show up, even when they don’t want to show up, even when they don’t feel good they show up, because they’re a part of something bigger than themselves. And they don’t want to let everybody else down.”

The veterans don’t just come from Josephine County but from neighboring counties, too. One man travels an hour-and-a-half twice a month to come to practices, she said.

Some older veterans have also begun mentoring younger vets — from the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. “We really weren’t expecting that. … That has been huge, because for Vietnam vets, it gives them another purpose,” Pickart said.

The war-on-terrorism era vets aren’t the only demographic to have become involved with the program. 

“We have one World War II vet, and a couple of Korean vets that like to just come to listen, which is another unexpected outcome,” she said.

The groups aren’t just boys’ clubs. Pickart said a Vietnam veteran who died recently of ALS, came to the practices up until about a month before her death. “Even though she couldn’t talk and she was in a wheelchair, she could still hit all of the notes on the piano.”

Wives and sweethearts of the vets are also welcome to join in. They often come to sing with the group or play other instruments.

Pickart says she, too, has benefited from the program. Working in veterans services for almost 20 years can be a “high-stress job” — dealing with the U.S. Department of Veterans to help ex-service members get the benefits they’re entitled to.

The music program allows her to be more than a “money fairy to these guys.”

A guitar player since the age of 10, Pickart said the program has helped her to “evolve” in the area of music, which she loves. She also gets to share that joy with veterans who are “somewhat broken and help heal them as well.”

“So it’s been very powerful in the sense that not only does it help me to keep my head in the game and stay focused in my job, it just brings a little more light and dimension to what it is I do.”

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