Medtar: Empowering Hospitalized Children Through Guitar
by WholeNote
Recently, some of you may have had the pleasure of sharing guitar stories and tips with Rex Jones through our discussion forums. While Rex leads a very busy life as a biomedical tech in the Chicago area, in addition to bettering himself as a fellow six-stringer, he also heads a very unique and interesting organization:
Medtar.
Medtar is a Chicago-based, not-for-profit organization that empowers hospitalized children with the gift of music. Recently, Medtar donated four
restored guitars to the Snow City Arts Foundation (SCFA), another non-profit organization which promotes the arts in children's hospitals in Chicago. These guitars are being used to teach music to the patients at Rush Children's Hospital by the SCFA's Musician-In-Residence. The sole purpose of Medtar, according to Rex, is "to place guitars and accessories into the hands of children and young adults and to promote a love of music, creativity, imagination, the arts, and the sharing of ideas that playing a musical instrument generates."
The guitars donated by Medtar include an Ibanez Dreadnought, an Epiphone 12-string acoustic, a Goya electric jazz guitar, and a Framas children's acoustic guitar. Each instrument was donated to Medtar in poor condition before being restored to near mint condition. These restorations were performed either by Rex, or in more extreme cases, by Rick Cremer of Cremer Guitarworks in North Aurora, IL. Each guitar was not only repaired, but also properly set up, intonated, and equipped with a hard-shell case. The restored guitars were then donated by Medtar, and have already been put to very good use by Rush Hospital's budding child musicians. In addition, Gore Music recently donated a box of Elixir acoustic guitar strings to Medtar for the children, and Frank Marino has volunteered to give some lessons and sign some guitars the next time he's in Chicago.
For Rex, the Snow City Arts Foundation opened his eyes to the healing properties of music. This idea has been validated by the fact that as of late 1998, the American Music Therapy Association (http://www.namt.com) had over 5,000 members and 69 U.S. universities had started graduate programs in music therapy.
If you have any old guitars, guitar parts & accessories, CDs, hard shell cases, headphone amps, lessons on video, repair tools, or anything else that you would like to donate, you can contact Rex using the following info:
Rex Jones
Director, Medtar
E-Mail: medtar@mediaone.net
Phone: (630) 739-9833 (mornings and weekends)
Medtar also has two drop-off spots in the Western suburbs of Chicago:
1. Cremer Guitarworks
153 S. Lincolnway (Rt. 31)
North Aurora, IL
(630) 897-0006
2. Disk Replay
1001 W. 75th St (SW corner Lemont and 75th)
Woodbridge, IL
(630) 985-9676
You can drop off your donations or money at either location, or you can e-mail or call Rex and he will happy to meet with you personally. As Rex puts it:
"I have never sold a guitar that I truly liked. I have always given them away to people I felt would cherish that guitar as much as I had. I always wanted to make sure I found a good home for the guitars I had outgrown. Well, I can't think of a better home for that old guitar down in the basement or in a closet somewhere, than in the arms of some kid going through a rough time. If you can donate that guitar to me, I promise it will be put into top-notch shape and find its way into the arms of some young people who really need to hold it...."
