Jonatha Brooke + Gayatri Devi

The singer/songwriter Jonatha Brooke recently lost her mother to dementia after caring for her in her own home for over a year. She discusses the role of music and caregiving with Director of the New York Memory and Healthy Aging Services, Dr. Gayatri Devi.
“I had no idea what I was getting into when I moved her here with me, but it was a calling, deep and lonely, that I could not ignore, and I’d do it all again in half a heartbeat. In the muddle of her dementia, my mother found the rapt audience she had always sought. We were constantly surprised by her spontaneous “Stoney” theatre. She loved to make us laugh, she would come up with nonsensical songs daily, or at least deliver the “Cream of Wheat” jingle on cue. Her arm gestures alone were a private ballet. She rhymed, punned, deadpanned.” – Jonatha Brooke
Jonatha Brooke has been writing songs, making records, and touring since her early days in Boston with her band The Story, which released two albums, Grace in Gravity and The Angel in the House, on Elektra Records. In 1995 Ms. Brooke released the first of two solo albums on MCA/Universal, Plumb, followed by Ten Cent Wings in 1997. In 1999 she started her own label, Bad Dog Records, and has since released six more albums. Her latest, The Works, which combines previously unheard, unpublished Woody Guthrie lyrics with her own music and arrangements, she introduced in her most recent show here at the Rubin’s Naked Soul series. This conversation marks her fourth appearance at the Rubin.
Gayatri Devi MD is the Director of the New York Memory and Healthy Aging Services and a Clinical Associate Professor at New York University School of Medicine. Dr. Devi has specialized in the early diagnosis and treatment of memory disorders related to aging and menopause for over twelve years and serves as an Attending Physician at Lenox Hill Hospital ofNew York City.Dr. Devi has presented papers at national meetings of the American Neurological Association, the American Neuropsychiatric Association and the North American Menopause Society. She has appeared in the media to discuss memory disorders, including the BBC, Reuters, FOX, ABC, and 1010 WINS. She was a featured expert on a cover article of memory in Time magazine. She is President of the National Councilon Women’s Health. She has participated in and led several phase II and III clinical drug trials for the treatment of memory disorders. She is the author of Estrogen, Memory and Menopause (Alphasigma Press; 2000) and What your doctor may not tell you about Alzheimer’s Disease (Time Warner Books; 2004).

Mnemonic Art Tour
Take advantage of a short tour of some paintings in the collection that function as mnemonic devices. The iconography in these paintings serve to reference specific passages in the sutras. That is why most of these works were not meant to be revealed to those who were not already initiates. The tour will include two types of paintings: narratives such as the life of the Buddha, and mandalas which are complex two-dimensional diagrams of one’s multi-dimensional state of mind.