To that end, Sands hosts an annual seminar in Ireland, which he founded with Pete Seeger, called the Music of Healing, that brings members of opposing paramilitary groups together through music.
“We have people who normally wouldn’t talk to each other — they would shoot each other,” he says.
That includes Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams and Democratic Unionist Party leader Jeffrey Donaldson, who attended Music for Healing in 2008. Bitter enemies, the two refused to shake hands at the seminar, Sands says. But during a rendition of Seeger’s “Where Have All the Flowers Gone,” performed by Seeger’s grandson, Tao Rodriguez-Seeger, Sands says a curious thing happened.
“Suddenly I realized both [Adams and Donaldson] were singing the song,” he recalls Sands. “People said afterwards, ‘Well, if they can sing a song together, it doesn’t matter if they don’t shake hands.’ It was a very moving moment.”
https://www.sevendaysvt.com/vermont/tommy-sands-and-the-music-of-healing/Content?oid=2243029
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3CZX3nJEus
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