Léonie from Cuijk donated her kidney to her sick mother. To reflect on this, father Marcel Siebers wrote a special piece of music for the carillon. And that piece can be heard from church towers and other chimes in hundreds of places.
Twelve years ago, Gita (63), Marcel’s wife, was told that she had cystic kidneys. That is a hereditary kidney disease. Ultimately, Gita needs a new kidney. She will receive it from her daughter Léonie in 2020.
“I thought it was such a logical thing to do,” says Léonie (40). “When I heard that my mother was not doing well, I didn’t hesitate for a moment. I wanted to give my kidney to my mother. That’s how it should be.”
“I’ve never seen her so energetic.”
It is something very special for Gita that she received a kidney from her daughter. “Who am I that I can even get a kidney. Let alone your daughter,” she says. “It’s usually mothers who give. The fact that something so great is given to you is something that cannot be expressed in words.”
Gita has been doing much better since the transplant. She walks and cycles a lot. Léonie says: “I’ve never seen her with such energy. That is a very big gift. I have two children. They now really have their grandmother back.”
Marcel Siebers, Gita’s husband, is a carillonneur. You can hear him more often from, for example, the church towers in Cuijk, Huissen and Venlo. He wrote ‘Transplant Ballad’, a piece of music for the carillon, about his wife’s illness and donating his daughter’s kidney.
“Twelve years of illness and healing in five minutes of music.”
“I just wanted to do something for the whole thing,” he says. “It has had a big impact. Also that our daughter donated. I wanted to do something in return.” The music became a way for Marcel to process it all. “I turned twelve years of diagnosis and healing into five minutes of music.”
The piece is also a bit of an ode to his daughter. “I would initially donate myself,” says Marcel. “But my kidney function was just too little to be allowed to donate. Then my daughter insisted. And she couldn’t talk herself out of that.”
The piece can be heard all week from Sunday from more than a hundred church towers in the Netherlands. “With the song I want to draw attention to the Kidney Foundation during their collection week,” says Marcel. On Sunday he will play the piece in public for the first time from the church in Cuijk.
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