These therapy mini horses play the piano for hospital patients

"Victoria Nodiff-Netanel carries a 32-key piano everywhere, including hospitals, schools, police stations and parties. But it's not for her to play. She has trained her nine miniature horses to run their muzzles along the keyboard, creating tunes that are as tumultuous as they areamusing. Music is one way the mares, part of Nodiff-Netanel's nonprofit called Mini Therapy Horses, comfort people, especially hospital patients, in Southern California."

"The horses are obedient and housebroken and can do tricks, like standing on their hind legs, giving high-fives and kicking small balls. They performtheir trademark activity - playing the keyboard - for thousands of people in hospitals annually, including those who are being fitted for a prosthesis, waking up from anesthesia or recovering from post-traumatic stress disorder. According toa Los Angeles hospital, a patient in hospice once asked to see one of the horses before he died."

""Wherever you go, you're bringing joy," said Nodiff-Netanel, who added that she feels like Santa Claus on the job. "It's pretty hard not to have a smile and feel joy when you see a little tiny horse - a beautiful little horse - playing a keyboard." Her obsession with horses began as a child, when Nodiff-Netanel played with stuffed and plastic horse toys, made paintings of horses and attended camps where she rode and groomed horses."

"Nodiff-Netanel, who describes herself as "half-horse," quit the sport in 2008 to paint full-time. But she wanted a miniature horse as a pet, soshe bought Black Pearl, a cuddly foal with a black-and-white coat, at a ranch in Solvang, California. Nodiff-Netanel taught Pearl to smile, stand on her hind legs and pull a cart."

Victoria Nodiff-Netanel carries a 32-key piano to hospitals, schools, police stations, and parties, where her nine miniature horses play the keyboard. The nonprofit Mini Therapy Horses uses the performances to comfort people, especially hospital patients, including those fitted for prostheses, waking from anesthesia, or recovering from post-traumatic stress disorder. The horses are trained to be obedient and housebroken and can perform tricks such as standing on hind legs, giving high-fives, and kicking small balls. They play for thousands of people annually, and a hospice patient once requested to see one of the horses before dying. Nodiff-Netanel’s lifelong connection to horses began with toys, paintings, and riding camps, later leading to dressage and full-time painting.

Read at The Washington Post