Beethoven “Moonlight Sonata” for Old Elephant

Artist and musician Paul Barton plays piano for a 61-year-old former logging elephant in a sanctuary set up for sick, old, disabled, abused and rescued elephants near the River Kwai.

Mongkol is a 61-year-old former logging elephant. His captive-held life was spent hauling trees in the Thai forest. His body shape is deformed through hard labor, he lost his right eye and tusk in this brutal logging practice. Mongkol was rescued and brought to Elephants World to spend the rest of his days relaxing peacefully in freedom by the River Kwai. I discovered Mongkol is an extremely gentle, sensitive elephant who enjoys music, especially this slow movement by Beethoven which I play to him occasionally in the day and night.

For Paul this is a passion project in which he attempts to bring a little peace and entertainment to the used and sometimes abused former work Elephants , below is a video of Paul playing for Romsai , a blind Elephant he calls "a friend" who sadly passed away shortly after this video was filmed.

Romsai was an old, blind, rescue bull elephant. He could barely stand towards the end of his life. Romsai seemed to like gentle classical piano music with a singing melody. I often noticed Romsai physically react to the rise and fall in musical phrases, lean forward and raise a back leg. At the end of each piece he became calm and still.

Romsai was a former logging elephant. He never worked in tourism, and in his retirement was kept well away from visitors, as bull elephants can be extremely dangerous, especially in must. Despite that, Romsai was always gentle with me during the 10 years I was privileged to play piano music for him. Romsai passed away from old age shortly after my wife Khwan filmed this video.

There is still beauty in this world , you just have to look for it.

I've seen video's in the past with the Elephants (apparently) enjoying the music. But this one is nw to me so thanks for that.

Watching them always left a nice feeling inside.


Johnny

a reply to: gortex


💙

a reply to: gortex

The 2nd video brought a tear to my eye, beautiful.

Thanks for posting this!

Here's a short 7 minute documentary in which Paul explains his motivation and experiences with the Elephants.