Dr. Lisa Gilbert, Director of Undergraduate Studies for the Educational Studies program, was awarded a $5,000 grant last spring from Washington University's Mindfulness Science and Practice Cluster for an individual project entitled “Looped Soundscapes: Composing and Creating Harp Music for Use in Mindfulness Settings and Research.”
“No matter our role in education – as teachers, students, policymakers, or researchers – our field can be a stressful one. That’s why it’s particularly gratifying that we’ve already found ways to use this project in service of our community,” said Gilbert, who performed in Graham Chapel during the presidential election as part of a partnership with the Office for Religious, Spiritual, & Ethical Life.
About the Project
Sound can be a powerful anchor for meditation. Yet the resources available to both researchers and musicians are often constrained: researchers need a stable set of compositions and recordings that meet certain criteria, and musicians often search for advice beyond playing old favorites or improvising. This transdisciplinary, artistic work will contribute to our broader community via the composition of repetitive loops conducive to meditative states, both written and recorded, all ultimately made freely available to researchers and therapeutic musicians alike.
Throughout the project, consultations with disciplinary specialists in music, neuroscience, and religious studies will allow for the identification of best practices and emergent questions. For example, what do musicians say about what makes for satisfying phrases, and what patterns ‘sit naturally’ on the harp, thus making the compositions accessible to a wide range of skill levels? Likewise, if music is organized sound, how might compositions with specific characteristics allow neuroscientists to test which organizational patterns (speed, length, pitch, etc.) are particularly conducive to mindfulness practices? The Mindfulness Cluster’s anti-bias values will further guide the pursuit of a path characterized by respect for religious traditions and cultural values embedded in chant and other longstanding uses of sound for meditation.
About the Grant
The newly created Incubator for Transdisciplinary Futures Cluster on Mindfulness Science and Practice at Washington University in St. Louis is offering Small Grants of up to $5,000 to support activities related to the advancement and promotion of the Mindfulness Cluster. Our mission is to achieve a more systemic integration of mindfulness science and practice, to inform our understanding of how mindfulness can be best applied, taught, and implemented. Likewise, by developing a deeper respect for, and appreciation of, the historical, philosophical, and religious contexts in which mindfulness practices are situated, we hope to provide a more effective evaluation of their physiological and psychosocial mechanisms of action.
