FAYETTEVILLE -- The man struggled for air, his breaths ragged and quick.
Beth Stockdell entered the patient's hospice room at the suggestion of a doctor and quietly set up her harp in the corner, out of the way. Playing a song that was more background noise than anything recognizable, she matched the pace of her song to the rate of his breathing.
Fast, transient.
She began to slowly, imperceptibly bring down the pace. The patient's breathing slowed with it.
Leaving the Circle of Life Hospice in Springdale that day, she felt better having helped someone who was struggling.
It wasn't the first time Stockdell had been there during a patient's last days, and it certainly wasn't the last.
Years earlier when she was learning the instrument, two of her friends -- Mary Ann and Bob -- both became ill unexpectedly, were placed in hospice and died within months of each other. But not before Beth spent some hours by their bedsides, serenading and keeping them company in their final moments.
Stockdell, 46, grew up in a family rooted in the healing professions. Her father was a psychologist, her biological mother and sister both nurses and her mom was a director at a hospital for disabled children. Because of that and her Presbyterian upbringing, which placed a special emphasis on volunteering, hospice care seemed like a natural way she could help others.
"The church we belong to was mission-oriented within the community," Stockdell says. "That's what you do."
Playing harp for Bob and Mary Ann solidified two things for Stockdell -- that she had what it took to play music in front of other people, and that the hospice environment was where she wanted to be.
For the past seven years, she has devoted countless hours to playing harp at Circle of Life. It seems to literally help patients breathe easier, helps alleviate tension and stress for the doctors, nurses and staff members who work hard to provide end of life care and it becomes a regular platform for Stockdell's music.
"They always look forward to her music," says Mary McKinney, chief executive officer of Circle of Life. "Emotionally, what they do is very taxing. For some of us, that music fills us back up."
Stockdell says the music is designed to blend into the background, but is much more than that.
"Her compassion is very evident through her music," McKinney says. "In our hospice home, she finds the perfect time for the patient and family. It's soothing. She plays people to heaven."
That ability was honed through a clinical musician program, where Stockdell learned how music could improve a medical setting, and how to foster a comforting environment for someone near death.
"If they're closer to dying, I play slower and with bigger breaks," she says. "Not a specific tempo, but a ragged one. They have a chance to [pass], if it's their time. It's powerful what music can do."
The responsibility was overwhelming at first, but now Stockdell enjoys training other hospice volunteers and helping ease the fear that they have nothing to offer.
"A lot of people come to that training and they're still not sure exactly what they're going to do with hospice and they're scared, just like I was," she says. "You think you want to do this but walking in the door is a scary thing."
Stockdell is not the only musician who plays at Circle of Life. There are pianists, a dulcimer group and another harpist, but her contribution stands apart.
"[Her music] helps you settle down, if you're anxious or stressed, which is the situation for our families," McKinney says, pointing out that even though Stockdell is not a doctor, she knows exactly where she can do the most good. "Through intuition, she finds the right space, positions herself and assesses needs."
Last week, Stockdell released a debut album, A Priceless Meadow, three years in the making. The project expands her gift to hospice. Staff members can play the CD when she's not there, and two concerts, at 6 p.m. Nov. 13 at Circle of Life and 2 p.m. Nov. 16 at Legacy Village in Bentonville, will benefit the organization.
Donations for the concert tickets and from CD sales will go to benefit Circle of Life.
AGAINST THE GRAIN
Stockdell was born in Portland, Ore., where her father raised her and her three siblings to be well read, giving of their time and to have a love of National Public Radio.
Weekends were spent reading. Even the house was designed and built to withstand an extreme amount of weight in books.
The resulting intelligence and thoughtfulness are what stands out to everyone around her.
"She's very intelligent, focused and organized," says Jeannie Lee, a fellow church member and musical friend. "She's extremely talented in many areas, a sweet personality, gentleness of spirit and an avid reader."
"One of the things I really appreciate about Beth is just how smart she is," says husband Rick Stockdell. "A combination of intellectual smart and common sense street smart.
"A lot of people will consult with her and I certainly appreciate her thoughts on any number of topics."
When she was growing up, free time was for volunteering. Though her father hoped she would become a candy striper to fit in with the rest of the medical family, Stockdell instead worked at the Portland Police Department with victims of break-ins and burglaries.
"I probably should have become a nurse. It was part of the [family] DNA, but I didn't want anything to do with that at the time," she says. "The ironic part of my life was I ended up back in a medical environment.
"So, no, I didn't do anything the way I was supposed to. I didn't do anything the easy way."
Stockdell tried the flute, but put her musical ambitions on hold after spending a few hours frozen with fear at a church function where she was asked to perform.
"If you would have told me that, 'In your future you would be a professional musician, and you'll play in front of people all the time,' I would have said 'You're nuts. You're absolutely nuts, there's no way.'"
Meanwhile, Fred Child's classical music program was the soundtrack of her life. It aired in Portland long before it was on NPR, and sparked her undying love of music.
When she followed her husband to Arkansas, her family and that 24-hour classical station were the things she missed most.
THERE WILL BE MUSIC
Arriving in the Ozarks in 1999, Stockdell was unhappy to leave her home, to leave her job as a wedding photographer -- which she'd had for a decade -- and her marriage wasn't going well.
Though she was hesitant, she knew there was merit in giving the Natural State a shot.
"I said, 'Over my dead body,' but [later] I said, 'Well, OK. If I move to Arkansas, I can say I've done everything I can to save this marriage.'"
She made the most of her time by studying organizational management at John Brown University and began to daydream about what would make her happy.
"When I finish school, there's going to be music in my life," Stockdell promised herself. "I'm going to do something in music. I don't know what it is yet. But that's what it's going to be."
For a reason unknown to her, the harp stood out. It was the life raft that saw her through to graduation, which coincided with her divorce in 2002.
Handed a reprieve, Stockdell was getting out of Dodge, so to speak. She quit her job, packed her bags and waited for one last thing. If she sold some property, she could pay the debt accrued from the divorce and never look back.
But her property didn't sell.
Disappointed, she unpacked her bags and began taking music lessons, at first on the piano and then on the harp, and volunteering at KUAF-FM, 91.3, the Fayetteville NPR affiliate.
She answered phones at fundraisers and got to know station manager Rick Stockdell.
It wasn't until Stockdell's 36th birthday, which followed their respective divorces, that the two had a chance to get to know each other on a KUAF Mozart tour through Vienna; Salzburg, Austria; and Prague.
Walking through the cobbled streets of Europe, they fell in love. When they returned, they started dating. And as their love grew, so did her music.
PERSEVERING PLAYER
Playing the harp began as an escape for Beth Stockdell, but it came with its own set of challenges.
The instructors in the region were few and far between, and they had a lot of expectations.
"They assume that you started at age 6, that you trained at the university classically, that you play the pedal harp, the symphony harp, and that's what you do," Stockdell says. "You can go back and play the lever harp as a side thing, a lesser harp."
As a student who started in her mid-30s, played the lever harp and enjoyed playing all genres of music, Stockdell was not exactly what instructors expected.
Rather than politely declining to be her instructor, one teacher went further and discouraged her from doing it at all.
"As a professional classical harpist, she told me at 35 that I would never learn to play the harp, it would not happen," she says.
It was enough to make Stockdell question whether her "disadvantages" were crippling. She put the instrument down for six months before convincing herself otherwise.
"She was discouraged by another harpist who said she would never learn anything because she was starting too late," Rick Stockdell says. "I think she took it as a challenge and decided, 'Well, you may be talking about some people, but not me.' And she did."
Stockdell resumed her lessons with instructors in Portland and attended harp conferences around the country. Her first performances were at hospice and in her church.
"The first time I saw her play publicly, I was more nervous than her," Rick Stockdell says. "She just steps out and is so willing to put herself in front of people and perform. It's amazing."
"Listening to her play has this way of just lowering your blood pressure," Lee says. "It's extremely calming and gentle.
"She views her artistry of the harp as a service she can offer. She was never concerned about 'Oh is this going to make a career for me?' It was more about how this serves the larger community."
As she gained confidence in herself and abilities, she expanded her musical world to performing at special events and teaching students of all ages.
"I'll never be at that stage where I give my student a piece of music and won't remember how I struggled on that piece of music," she says. "It's not too far back to remember. I can really empathize."
That confidence didn't dissolve all her struggles as a professional musician, though. The past decade has brought a series of surgeries -- on shoulders, fingers, ears, etc. -- that make recovery and easing back into music an ordeal.
Her love for the harp has always been a priority, sometimes above her health. Only 10 days after appendix surgery, Stockdell played harp at a wedding against a physician's advice.
She enjoys playing harp at nontraditional locations like the Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport in Bentonville, the Fayetteville Public Library and Collier Drug Store. Music most wouldn't assume appropriate for the stringed instrument -- Rolling Stones, The Beatles, "Stairway to Heaven" -- surprise audiences.
In her debut album, Stockdell wanted something that could be all-inclusive, would be well used in a hospice setting, would showcase her work and would be fun and easy to listen to.
Needless to say, she changed her mind too many times to count and chose many songs from people she knew personally. Even in that act, her intuition and compassion were at work.
"She liked playing my music and bought it," says harpist RoJean Loucks. "My music arises from my personal experiences. It's very descriptive of emotional situations and she picked up on that."
"Every little thing you do as a volunteer makes an impact," Stockdell says. "It helps somebody in some way. You don't have to do this one thing. Everybody has time, treasure or talent. I just think we can't operate as a society if we don't do some of those things to help each other."
NW Profiles on 10/12/2014