Nursing home residents, nurses beautifully re-create iconic album covers on lockdown
Hannah Frishberg
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Sydmar Lodge Care Home residents and carers have been re-creating classic album covers. The home has now been in lockdown for four months. Robert Speker/Twitter
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Quarantine hasn't stopped these seniors from rocking.
North London's Sydmar Lodge Care Home has been under lockdown for four months, but restricted living hasn't curtailed residents' creativity: The nursing home's seniors and carers alike have been spending their time re-creating classic album covers.
In a now viral tweet, the home's activities coordinator, Robert Speker, posted a selection of side-by-side shots showing iconic albums next to the re-created versions of them. These include a version of Adele's "21," where a resident assumes the same facial expression and head positioning, but replaces the original label with her own name and age — Vera, 93.
In a version of Taylor Swift's "1989," a resident wears the same shirt as Swift, but puts her own initials and birth year at the bottom of the Polaroid-design — R.C., 1922.
Bruce Springsteen's "Born in the USA" is transformed into Martin Steinberg's "Born in England," with the St. George's Cross instead of America's stars and stripes, and David Bowie's "Aladdin Sane" is redone as Roma Cohen's "Sydmar Lodge."
One Sydmar Lodge Care Home resident re-created Adele's "21."
Robert Speker/Twitter
The "Born in the USA" re-creation.
Residents, including this one, re-created famous album titles with personal touches, such as adding their own birth years.
After posting the images, Speker received an outpouring of support, with some proposing that the home make a calendar of the re-created album covers. Others made requests for which album covers the residents should re-create next. For many fans, the images were inspiring and brought to mind memories of their own elderly family's experience maintaining their internal youth.
On the heels of the project's viral success, Speker started a GoFundMe called "The Show Must Go On" to continue funding fun senior activities.
"Elderly people will remain in lockdown for a long time, and I want to make their time as happy and full of enjoyment and interest as possible," Speker wrote in the fund-raiser's description. "As this situation is ongoing it could be months before the situation changes for them, and the need to keep them happily entertained and full of spirit has never been more crucial."
In the US, elderly music lovers have found solace in quarantine with Radio Recliner, the first and only retiree-run radio station dedicated to the music and memories of the Silent Generation.
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