Music, laughs, and good company combine to improve the mental well-being of people living with dementia and Alzheimer’s in a pioneering care home performance project.

Black Mountains Comedy Festival has added a transformative mental health and well-being element to its January 2025 programme. The Festival has commissioned Cardiff-based comedy performers Kitsch n Sync to contribute to the improved well-being of people with dementia and Alzheimer’s.

The performance, featuring comedy, dance, and music, responds to the dementia emergency by using comedy to help people living with dementia in care homes, aiming to support them to feel less isolated.

The innovative performance is designed in close consultation with an academic, Dr Gary Christoper, a leading dementia and memory specialist from Swansea University. Gary advised Kitsch n Sync in ways the show could support the audience’s ability to communicate, reduce their sense of isolation, and improve mental well-being.

Through a special commission funded by Arts Council Wales, the performance – Silver Screen Sisters – has been created and performed by the Cardiff-based collective Kitsch n Sync. Silver Screen Sisters will feature in 2025’s festival in a family-friendly matinee on Saturday, February 1.

Silver Screen Sisters is touring six South Wales care homes, including the Greenhill care home in Crickhowell.

To create Silver Screen Sisters, Kitsch n Sync worked with Dr. Gary Christoper, a leading dementia and memory specialist from Swansea University.

Dementia is on the rise. Research commissioned by the leading dementia charity, Dementia UK, reveals that 982,000 people live with dementia in the UK. This number is expected to rise to 1.4 million by 2040. (see notes for editors for links to May 2024 research).

In Wales alone, 45,000 people are living with dementia, with a profound negative impact on people living with the disease and their families.

These figures reveal the scale of dementia and underline the need for imaginative responses to the disease, including creative activities.

The Black Mountains Comedy Festival runs between Thursday and Saturday . Comedians on the bill include leading lights of the comedy circuit: Leroy Brito, Huw Davies, Eleri Morgan, Josh Elton, Rob Hughes, Ignacio Lopez, Angela Barnes, Ross Smith and Mel Owen. The festival features a Cymraeg/Welsh language night of comedy with Beth Jones, Carwyn Blayney, Daniel Glyn and Steffan Evans.