by Jordan | Dec 20, 2018 | Chordoma Blog
Visit to the new location of Tyler’s Room Today we visited the new location at 10 Union Square East. Housed in a new building that is welcoming and airy, we are proud to be on the Louis Armstrong Floor. Tyler’s Room is open five days a week offering music therapy. There are a variety of drums, guitars, a piano and state of the art recording equipment. We are delighted to be a part of Mount Sinai’s vision of healthcare for the whole...
by Jordan | Jan 5, 2016 | Chordoma Blog
Kim Brower and her coworkers at PricewaterhouseCoopers made a generous donation of toys, games and puzzles in Tyler’s name. We appreciate their support of Mount Sinai-Beth Israel and we hope their gift brings some holiday joy to the hospital’s...
by Jordan | Mar 14, 2015 | Chordoma Blog
The Fishbin family, of Port Washington, and the Seaman family, of Merrick, have known each other since their sons attended sleepaway summer camp together many years ago. Now they are joining together for the benefit of two organizations that are dear to their hearts: Rock and Wrap it Up! and Music Never Stops: The Tyler Seaman Foundation. On March 27, a concert at City Winery, the intimate concert venue and winery in downtown Manhattan, featuring Midwest funk-rock band The Main Squeeze will raise money for both organizations. Rock and Wrap it Up! recovers prepared food and other supplies that go untouched at places like concerts, sporting events, hotels and schools and delivers it to food banks, shelters, and other agencies fighting poverty. Music Never Stops looks to provide music therapy programs for teenagers with serious illnesses, starting at “Tyler’s Music Room,” a space for music therapy in Beth Israel Medical Center on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. The charity provides funding for musical instruments, recording equipment, software, streaming accounts and concert...
by Jordan | Mar 4, 2015 | Chordoma Blog
The beautiful guitars John Catt and Blue Star Connection gave to Music Never Stops have been delivered to Tyler’s Room. We’ll have a little “welcome” event later this month, but for now, here’s a look at the guitars in their new...
by Jordan | Jan 5, 2015 | Chordoma Blog
The supporters of Music Never Stops: the Tyler Seaman Foundation kept the good deeds coming over the holidays, as our friends made two wonderful contributions to Tyler’s Room and Mount Sinai Beth Israel. John Catt of Blue Star Connection gave two beautiful guitars: a Fender Squire Stratocaster (with striking artwork!) and an Ibanez Artcore Hollow Body. “Listen to that sustain,” as Nigel Tufnel might say. John was an early inspiration for us as we started MNS, and he’s also the person who introduced us to our remarkable partners at Mount Sinai Beth Israel. His latest gift will bring that much more joy to Tyler’s Room patients. We’re also pleased to report that Kim Brower, a friend of Tyler’s from Camp Baco, led a toy drive at PricewaterhouseCoopers that will also benefit Mount Sinai Beth Israel. Thanks,...
by Jordan | Jan 4, 2015 | Chordoma Blog
Mount Sinai Beth Israel’s newsletter features the dedication of Tyler’s Room. Thanks to everyone who attended and all who have supported us so...
by Jordan | Nov 12, 2014 | Chordoma Blog
Last month we were proud to officially dedicate Tyler’s Room. We welcomed about 20 relatives and friends along with Beth Israel staffers and together we took our first look at the room itself. Though it’s tucked into a corner of Beth Israel’s sixth floor, it doesn’t look like part of a hospital. It looks like a small but heavily decorated basement room full of musical instruments. There are guitars, a ukulele, congas, keyboard, stereo, and on a somewhat more technologically impressive note, a mini recording studio complete with digital turntables. You can download a song and alter it, record yourself playing and singing, and scratch and switch between two different songs. The whole setup looks like a ton of fun to play around with. Photos courtesy of Jacqueline Smith at Mount Sinai Beth...
by Jordan | Oct 22, 2014 | Chordoma Blog
Today my family and the music therapy staff of Mount Sinai Beth Israel officially dedicated Tyler’s Room. We’ve been looking forward to this moment since February 2013, and it was deeply emotional and deeply gratifying to mark this occasion with the friends and family who have supported us. Dr. Joanne Loewy, Dr. Edward Conway Jr. and John Mondanaro spoke movingly and music therapists Wen Chang-Lit and Robin “Mitch” Mitchell showed us the top-notch recording and DJing equipment and software that patients will use. It wasn’t on the program, but my father and I couldn’t resist sitting down with Mitch and Dr. Loewy to jam for a couple of minutes after we’d cut the ribbon. Thanks again to the hundreds of friends and supporters who’ve helped us get to this point. We have a lot to be proud of and a lot of work to do. My remarks from this afternoon: “A memory is like a song – or maybe a song is like a memory. It can stay with you forever even if you’ve experienced it just once. It can give you encouragement, inspiration, comfort, strength and love, and it’s always yours but it exists to be shared. Sharing that piece of music or that treasured memory only adds to the joy it brings. My family started this project because we wanted to share the memory of someone who lived for music – and who through music lives for us still. My brother Tyler was a music lover all his life, passionate about hearing, making and sharing music. Because music is also a way of communicating that makes our...
by Jordan | Jun 20, 2014 | Chordoma Blog
Tyler’s Music Room is the first project of Music Never Stops: The Tyler Seaman Foundation. It is a music therapy facility at Mount Sinai Beth Israel in New York City. The project will augment Beth Israel’s existing music therapy capabilities, giving patients and their families more access to music therapy. The funding Beth Israel receives from Music Never Stops: the Tyler Seaman Foundation will allow them to hire two new therapists and help more patients, pursue new research, purchase instruments like Tyler’s red SG bass, buy concert tickets, get recording equipment so patients can record their own music, and set up iTunes and Spotify accounts so they can make mixes like Tyler did. Tyler’s life is a testament to the power of music, and through Tyler’s Room, we want to share it with young people like Tyler for years and years to come. Why music therapy? Tyler was a music lover who attended countless concerts and jam sessions and never tired of talking about music and listening to new music with family and friends. When he was diagnosed with a clival chordoma at the age of 14, he used the music of Dr. John and the Allman Brothers to stay calm during frightening meetings with doctors and long, sometimes invasive tests. — helped him keep his energy up during physical therapy. Derek Trucks and Bob Marley lifted his spirits. The Band assisted during his radiation treatments. He became a drummer and found new outlets in pounding the skins, covering favorite songs, and creating new ones with his family. Later in life, when he dealt with the news of a...
by Jordan | Jun 10, 2014 | Chordoma Blog
Band Together was a triumph for Music Never Stops: the Tyler Seaman Foundation and for Rock and Wrap It Up. The event honored Dori and Michael Fishbin for their work on behalf of Rock and Wrap It Up, an award-winning think tank that fights hunger and poverty. Highlights of the evening included dinner, live and silent auctions, and a performance by The Main Squeeze with special guest Vernon Reid. The event benefits Rock and Wrap It Up with a portion of the proceeds going to Music Never Stops: the Tyler Seaman Foundation. Dori and Michael received the Lena and Joseph Mandelbaum 2014 Humanitarian Award. Lena and Joseph Mandelbaum, Holocaust Survivors, inspired the anti-hunger and anti-poverty work of Rock and Wrap it Up! This award began in 2001 and past recipients include Sharon and Ozzy Osbourne, the Allman Brothers Band, MTV co-founder Leslie Leventman, and Alyssa and Cliff...
by Jordan | Jun 6, 2014 | Chordoma Blog
We’re in the middle of changing our look and the design of our site. This should give us a fresh look and make it easier for us to provide more frequent updates. It’s been just about one year since we held our kickoff fundraiser on Long Island and we’ve had a tremendous first year. In the next month or two the plaque marking Tyler’s Room should be installed and we’ll have a celebration to mark that achievement. An update from our fantastic Band Together fundraiser is also coming soon. In the meantime we’re planning our next moves. Stay...
by Jordan | Feb 11, 2014 | Chordoma Blog
Marley Jay (J04) (formerly Marley Seaman) lives in Brooklyn and works as a business reporter for the Associated Press. He has been at the AP for seven years. He has completed one book and is hard at work on his first novel. He and his family recently launched Music Never Stops: The Tyler Seaman Foundation, a new nonprofit that supports music therapy programs for teenagers with serious illnesses. His youngest brother, Tyler, died in October 2010 after battling clival chordoma, a rare type of spinal...
