Musician finds niche performing for seniors

Before and after a performance, Kathy Sullivan likes to mingle with the crowd. It gives the singer and guitarist the opportunity to hear the stories of her audience.

Lately many of those crowds are at senior citizen centers or retirement communities. Sullivan has found a niche in performing for an older generation.

“I love my audiences now, they’ve given me a passion I never had before for music,” she said.

Sullivan has been working as a professional musician since the 1970s, traveling and singing all over the country as part of a duo. In the late 1970s, she moved to Whitefish continuing to sing and strum her guitar as a single act at what is now Whitefish Mountain Resort, in local clubs and restaurants. This summer she was a regular performer at the Bar W Guest Ranch playing for all age ranges.

But she’s found a new passion in performing for an older crowd — though she says any age is always welcome.

“They’re the most amazing audience — in their mid-80s to 100,” she said. “They’ve seen so much in life, we can’t even imagine.”

“If they don’t like what I’m playing they’ll wheel themselves out or walk with a cane out of the room,” she adds with a laugh.

Sullivan has traveled to more than 90 retirement communities in Montana, Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Arizona, and California. She will be performing at the Whitefish Community Center on Jan. 11 as a sort of kickoff to her next tour and benefit for the center.

Through these retirement community tours, she’s seen firsthand the power of music and also makes connections talking with folks. She watched residents in memory care homes who are unable to communicate, but begin tapping their feet to the beat of a song.

“Music is an amazing tool for healing,” Sullivan said.

Once when Sullivan was getting ready to set up for a show, she walked in on an older woman playing piano. The 96-year-old woman told Sullivan how it had been her dream to perform alongside her parents on vaudeville, but instead they sent her to the prestigious Juilliard School of music.

“She became a concert pianist, but all she wanted to be was a stand up comic,” Sullivan recalled.

The music often brings back memories of the past. One older woman came up to Sullivan after a show saying that she hadn’t spoken since a stroke a few months earlier, but found herself singing along to one of the songs.

“To hear people’s stories, it give me such an energy,” she said. “And inspires me to learn new old music.”

Sullivan plays a wide range of music from the 1800s to current music. She tailors her music selections to the crowd, but the genre of her music is a total mixed bag including country western, show tunes, classic old standards, light rock, pop, folk music and kids song.

Her professional music career began in college at the University of Oregon when she was part of a folk music quintet called the Greek Singers. After college, she traveled the U.S. and Canada sharing the bill as a lead singer with one of the top lounge music and comedy duos of the 1970s, Keel & Sullivan.

After the duo retired, Sullivan moved to Whitefish. She continued to sing locally, but also took up photography as a second profession.

Sullivan began Mountain Photography taking photos on Big Mountain in the winter. Today she continues to take commercial whitewater photography during the summer on the Middle Fork of the Flathead River.

For the past nine years, Sullivan has turned the primary direction of her music career to playing at guest ranches, country clubs, resorts and for senior citizens all over the western states. She plays one show per night before moving on to the next audience in a new town.

“I like the freshness of the audience,” she said. “It’s the mood it puts me in — it’s something that makes a real difference in my life.”

The concert is Jan. 11 at 2:30 p.m. and cost is $10. For tickets and discounted price for groups call, 862-4923.