Believe it or not, but this cute blind elephant prefers to dance to classical music

It is mind-blowing to think how alike humans and animals can sometimes be. I’m not talking about physical appearance—the closest resemblance there are primates and that’s about it.

Animals continue to surprise and inspire us through their mental capacity for things we often find exclusively human. You know, things like emotion, empathy, the capacity for creativity and whatnot. What is most surprising to see is the fact that animals understand and partake in what we view as art and culture.

Take this for example: A British musician by the name of Paul Barton dragged out a piano into the middle of an elephant sanctuary and began playing classical music to a blind elephant named Lam Duan.

The female elephant’s response? A pretty human one. She began swaying from side to side, moving her trunk, and even stepping around as if to dance to the music.

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In his video, Barton explains that the gentle old female elephant named Lam Duan has been blind for most of her life. The 62-year-old elephant spends her days in ElephantsWorld which is an animal protection organization based in Wang Dong, Thailand. He then proceeds to play her some soothing classical music by Frédéric Chopin, Johann Sebastian Bach, Franz Schubert, and Erik Satie.

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What adds even more charm to this story is the idea of this kind-hearted pianist sharing his talent and time with someone who is blind and can’t enjoy the beauty of sight but can, however, enjoy all that is aural. It’s like reading to the blind except with music.

Barton got the idea to do this one day on the River Kwai bridge while filming a video for his channel. There, he found out about this elephant sanctuary that takes care of old, injured, handicapped logging, and street elephants. Since he loved elephants, he went down there and asked if he could bring in and play the piano to the elephants. They had no objection to that.