Bringing peace to dogs, one string at a time
10/2/2024
Roughly 3 million dogs are in shelters across the U.S. One Des Moines resident is using her cello-playing abilities to soothe, relax and spread the word that she says music can have on animals.
Cheryl Wallace once owned a jewelry business on Ingersoll Avenue. As time went on, she transitioned from doing business inside her store to art fairs.
“I wanted to help animals. But I was doing these art fairs, I was traveling a lot, and you can’t be a regular volunteer at a shelter if you’re traveling. So, I wanted to come up with an idea, something I could do for animals that wasn’t being done. And I thought, Cesar Millan can walk a dozen dogs at a time. I can’t do that. So, I kept with the idea of playing music for them,” Wallace said.
Wallace learned how to play the violin in elementary school on the East Coast. She went to grad school in New Jersey, and she performed as part of the Des Moines Community Orchestra. Before she chose an instrument to play at the shelters, she did some research.
“I looked online and read that cellos are closest to the human voice, and I bought one when I was in my 50s and taught myself to play. It was not too difficult, because I already played violin, and I started working on a repertoire and contacted shelters,” Wallace said.
Her first time experiencing the effect that music could have on dogs came from playing for one of her friend’s pets in 2018. Her music calmed down an excited dog and drew the less social ones to relax nearby.
This led to Wallace’s first performance at the Town and Country Humane Society in Papillion, Nebraska.
“I tried to contact other shelters closer, and they ignored or laughed or I just wasn’t getting a response. So, I was just so pleased to have them accept my offer. I went and played for them, and the dogs did indeed relax,” Wallace said.
Since that initial performance, Wallace has traveled the country, spreading her calming music to more than 450 shelters in double-digit states. She created her own tour when she planned a trip to visit a friend in Arkansas.
“At first, I thought, it’s an eight-hour drive. I don’t know about that. I looked at the map of the surrounding area, and I thought, Oh, well, if I bring my cello, then I could play in Kansas City, Oklahoma, I could play in Arkansas. And then I looked further east and realized Mississippi, Tennessee and Kentucky were an area fairly close, so I could play those, too. And I played in Illinois on the way back,” Wallace said.
On a trip to visit her brother in Connecticut, she put together a similar tour, playing at shelters in Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York and then, naturally, Connecticut. On the return leg, she played in West Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Mississippi and Alabama. All in all, the trip was 3,800 miles in the name of dog relaxation.
Wallace says the people and shelter owners she contacts say it never occurred to them that music could be soothing for the animals.
“They say, ‘Why would you even play for them?’ Well, they are in such a stressful situation, it really helps them to be calm. What works best for them is a very slow tempo, something close to their heart rate. That’s good and relaxing for them, and also low frequency, so the lower range of the cello works best,” Wallace said.
Wallace leaves CDs of her performances for the shelters so they can continue to play the music she performs. For her, it’s more than just bringing peace to shelter animals.
“It’s healing for me. I feel like I can do something to help them. When I started doing this, I couldn’t be a regular volunteer, but I could play,” Wallace said. “My mother used to sing love songs around the house, so I play some of the same things that she would sing.”
Wallace encourages shelters that have a desire to reach out to her to reach out through her website, wwwcello4dogs.com.
