Medical employees at Houston cancer center virtually perform Bruno Mars song to lift spirits

An employee choir at a cancer center in Texas brought joy to many in an online performance of Bruno Mars’ hit song, “Count on Me.”

Earlier this month, the employee choir at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston came together virtually to film themselves singing the song for their patients and fellow health care staff at the facility.

“We thought it would be important to be able to carry a message of hope for the patients, the patients’ families, as well as the employees,” choir director, Melvin Sword told “Good Morning America.”

For the past five years, Sword has led a group of 160 volunteer choir members made up of employees from the medical center. They typically come together for performances at Christmas or Veteran’s Day, but when Sword received an inquiry to conduct a virtual performance with the choir, he jumped at the opportunity to help get his members’ minds off their workload and asked them to participate.

To start, he combed through a list of songs to choose from. But when Sword came across “Count on Me,” he knew it was a perfect choice.

“We chose that particular song because we felt like the lyrics were very appropriate to give support,” he said. “We wanted to let patients and employees know that as individuals, we are there as an institution. And they can count on us to be able to help at any point in time.”

After Sword purchased the music from one of the song’s publishers, he enlisted the help from Paul Edelkamp, one of his choir members to coordinate the logistics and develop figure out how to record many people singing. Sword then filmed himself conducting the song in a video, which was then sent to choir members who wanted to participate.

In just a few days, video clips came pouring in from choir members singing their parts of the song, which their fellow colleagues, Lauren Lea and Michael Giannaccio, produced together in one clip to make it sound like everyone was singing all at once. They even included past photos of employees on the job helping patients.

“It was such a great honor to be a part of the talented people that volunteered their time to put this together,” said Edelkamp. “During the challenging time, we wanted to find a way to bring a message of inspiration, hope, friendship and love to our patients and colleagues.”

Amidst the coronavirus pandemic, MD Anderson has had to shift the way it operates in the past few weeks, and like many other health care centers, is giving its all to protect its patients and health care workers.

So the video was a break from the reality of the pandemic for everyone.

“This was made to uplift our patients and to encourage our entire MD Anderson family, as they are the real heroes,” said Theda Williams, a Program Manager in the Pediatrics Division at MD Anderson.

“It meant a lot to me,” said Sword of his experience working on the project with his choir. “There’s a number of people that said, ‘you can’t help but cry.’ It was like an emotional support that occurred that we’re seeing across the spectrum of people that not only enjoyed the sound of the music, but the words carried a deep message to them. It’s so fulfilling to see that happen, to see that response from people that they were touched and moved. That’s why we do what we do and why we have the joy of music that can then speak to administer to these individuals both mentally, physically, emotionally and as part of their lives.”

Since posting to social media, the group has received over 100,000 views on Facebook.

"We are so proud of this powerful message of support from MD Anderson to people all over the globe during this difficult time," said M.D. Anderson Cancer Center President Peter WT Pisters.