Rachel Krug sits on her hands while young pianist Myroslav Mykhailenko performs. She was 5 years old when she started playing the instrument herself and, if left unchecked, would press the shape of each chord she heard into her lap.

Krug, 84, is a resident at Springwell, a 15-acre senior living community in the center of Mount Washington. For nine months, she resisted the urge to play along when Mykhailenko, now a rising senior at the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University, performed weekly as Springwell’s musician-in-residence.

The program is simple: young musicians provide musical programming in exchange for housing at senior living facilities. Springwell was the pilot, hosting its first musician in 2015, and the program has since expanded to other senior communities in the state.

The musicians themselves find the experience to be rewarding and fulfilling, Mykhailenko said. Most importantly, music and the connection it provides are vital for fighting isolation in senior living communities.

“The care that they give is focused on using music as a bridge,” said Sarah Hoover, associate dean for innovation in the arts and health at Peabody Institute. She describes the musicians as being, in part, “like a resident grandchild.”

Nearly all the former Springwell musicians-in-residence returned this summer to commemorate the program’s 10th anniversary, an event Mykhailenko put together as a final project for Peabody.

He said farewell on the keys by playing Billy Joel’s “Piano Man” before symbolically passing the torch to the musician set to take over this fall: violinist Amir Kadamani González.

Hoover said the musicians and their communities are “co-creative” in producing intergenerational programming. The Peabody students leave the program more confident in performance and audience engagement, while the seniors serve as a sounding board for these early musicians.

And while the musicians are not health care workers, they do provide care.

Music in health care can reduce blood pressure, improve mood, decrease the length of hospital stays and lower the need for pain medication, said Hoover, who is also the author of “Music as Care: Artistry in the Hospital Environment."

The Peabody students facilitate classes and interact with residents in different sectors of Springwell: independent living, assisted living and memory care.

According to Hoover, music impresses on people the most from ages 15 to 25. For elders in memory care, Mykhailenko would play music from the 1940s to the 1960s, which Hoover calls the “sweet spot” for them.

“Our ability to continue to experience sound, and in this case music, lasts until the end of our life — even if capacities are diminished in other ways,” Hoover said.

The residents took notice as Mykhailenko’s confidence grew at his weekly performances.

“More people came to every concert,” Krug said, describing the musicians-in-residence as flowers ready to bloom. Over time, residents would dash to Mykhailenko’s recitals to get the best seat. “It was like, ‘Oh my goodness, I have to get down there.’”

Rather than simply playing a concert and exiting stage left, Mykhailenko taught the residents about the music he played — including its history and the significance behind it. After his bows, the young Peabody musician would chat with residents and form what he described as a “very special connection.”

“I’m not sure if everybody who went to the concerts realized how much they were learning,” Krug said. “They were just being warmed inside and out.”