EP64: Surgeons Guided by Pianist's Playing
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EP64: Surgeons Guided by Pianist's Playing
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About this listen
On Easter Sunday, April 20, 2025, surgeons at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida drilled 14 holes in jazz pianist Mark Burnell’s skull and inserted 200 electrodes in an attempt to halt his increasingly frequent seizures resulting from a brain injury that had been festering since a childhood accident. In the newly developed treatment protocol designed to remove damaged areas of the brain, Burnell was kept awake and instructed to play jazz on a mini-keyboard while also singing the tunes’ lyrics. If he played a wrong note or sang a wrong lyric, the doctors were alerted by his wife, vocalist Anne Burnell, who was at his side for the procedure. At her signal they would stop probing so as not to disturb the part of the brain used for making music. In this episode we interview the couple and hear their amazing, inspiring story. Stay tuned for the results of the surgery.