The Background
The story of Parkinsound has perhaps the most unlikely beginnings of all orchestra projects: it starts with a neurologist, a musician... and several Parkinson's patients.
About 4 years ago, Margarida Rodrigues – neurologist, specialist in Parkinson's disease – was singing in the choir of a community orchestra. There, she came up with the idea of using a community orchestra to try to help her patients recover.
At first glance, this seemed a preposterous idea. Patients with neurodegenerative diseases don't seem like ideal candidates to become musicians. They lose hope and the ability to play instruments. Or do they?... Margarida believed that taking part in an orchestra would be a stimulating cognitive challenge for her patients. It involves playing an instrument, following instructions, being attentive. She even came up with a name for the orchestra: Parkinson + sound = Parkinsound.
At the end of the concert, she went to talk to Pedro Santos, the conductor in charge. This encounter gave rise to two love stories. Their love for the Parkinsound Orchestra project. And for each other – proof that the greatest projects are always born out of love.
Pedro started rehearsing with Margarida’s patients. Some of them didn't know how to play an instrument. They had to learn from scratch.
The first rehearsals seemed chaotic. But they realized this was chaos preceding harmony. A wave of enthusiasm washed over them. This concert was a unique opportunity for the patients to prove to themselves and their families that they still had value.
The first concert was a historic moment. The audience was on their feet clapping. It was widely covered in the press. It was confirmation that despite Parkinson's disease, patients could be musicians in an orchestra. The disease inhibited mobility, not art or hope.
Challenge
With its rapid growth and with new sponsors on the horizon, the orchestra needed a brand identity that would allow it to professionalize itself – awareness, brand system, volunteers, partners – to better serve its musicians and the scientific community.
We understood that the logo, the brand’s DNA, needed a powerful symbol. An icon that could establish a connection between the orchestra and the disease.
Work
We created a new symbol representing the fusion between the troubling hand tremor and the artistic movement of a conductor's hands. It reveals the orchestra's ability to transform the tremor of the disease into music and hope. The lower part of the symbol shows a shaking hand. The upper part shows a hand conducting an orchestra. Two very different hands linked by a common purpose.
The colour red chosen for the symbol is the colour that identifies the fight against this disease worldwide.
The future
Parkinsound’s first concerts opened many doors. The scientific analysis has documented improvements on a clinical scale. The project was awarded the prize for best clinical research work by the Portuguese Society of Movement Disorders.
