Editor/book doctor for:

Waking the Spirit

by Andrew Schulman 

Picador, August 2016

 

Waking the Spirit follows the story of professional guitarist Schulman, beginning with surgery that left him in a coma, likely to die. When his wife played Bach's St. Matthew Passion (his favorite music) to him on his iPod, his vital signs started to stabilize and he survived - in many ways a medical miracle. For the last six years, Schulman has returned to the ICU, where he almost died, to play music to critically ill patients. Patient anecdotes about the power of music to alleviate pain and anxiety, to cut through dysphoria and delirium and to help patients in minimally conscious states make up the narrative arc of the book - while experts in neuroscience, critical care medicine, and music therapy provide scientific back up.