£1m Donation to Alzheimer Charity Motivated By Composer with Alzheimers

A heartwarming exchange between Paul Harvey, a composer that suffers from dementia, and Scottish billionaire Sir Tom Hunter was shown on the BBC today. Over lockdown, a video of the former music teacher was posted online in which he composes a piece using just four notes. It received a huge amount of attention, reaching over 2m people on twitter. The piece was aired on Radio 4's Broadcasting House for World Alzheimer's Day in 21 September and recorded with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra as a single - reaching No.1 in the iTunes and Amazon charts last week.

This caught the eye of Scotland's first ever billionaire, Sir Tom Hunter, describing Paul's performance as "lighting up the screen" and subsequently donating a sum of £1m from The Hunter Foundation to the Alzheimer's Society and Music for Dementia.

Mr Harvey's son posted the clip in aim of highlighting the ability for musical knowledge to survive through the disease. He said in an interview with the BBC: "Dad is so happy his music is resonating with people. He is being defined by his music, not his dementia and that is wonderful to see." You can watch the original clip of Paul Harvey's performance and his work with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra below.