Musical Health
*Cultivate a healthy, sustainable, grounded, energy-abundant, creative lifestyle
*Restore awareness and function by connecting through music

Resources For Healthy Musicians
with Somatic Movement expert Laura M. Gates

Musical Breathwork™ For Healthy Lifestyles 

with J.S. Bach

Listening Beyond Music and Health
with Dr. Keith Churchwell, President of Yale New Haven Hospital

In the last few decades, we have exploded with new insights into
emotional intelligence, neurology, breathwork, connective tissue,
and other communications systems that
can address chronic pain/stress and make sense of our whole human experience. The work in front of us now is how to implement that into applicable lifestyle improvements.


I am passionate about creating
Resources for healthy musicians &
Music listening for healthy lifestyles.

*This information is not meant to take the place of professional medical advice. If you need medical attention, please seek professional help immediately.


How can I support you or your organization as you define your specific challenges?

Wokshop / Coaching / Seminar Topics

Musical Breathwork™ (for More Expressive Performing)
uses musical elements such as the pulse, the melodic contours, the lengths of phrases, and harmonic colors to articulate the breath and to encourage a diversity of breath patterns.
Emotions have movement, so the music needs to breath with motion to express the emotions.
BETTER CONNECTIONS:
With ourselves: We improve the specificity/timing of our technique.
With our music partners and the audience: We cue with non-verbal gestures.


Musical Breathwork™ (for a Healthy Lifestyle)

is using physical sensation to make sense of the ideas and emotions. Breathing is the only action we do, that is both voluntary and involuntary.  It's interactive and it both activates our creativity and calms our minds to be able to take action.  Our minds have the agility and the ability to communicate in real time with our bodies, and our bodies participate...that is the miracle!
BETTER CONNECTIONS:
With ourselves: We learn to listen to our bodies and protect them.
With our community: We learn to listen to the energies around us so that we can respond more kindly.


Cultivate Your Creative Mode
Conscious Listening™ Café is an ultimate musical playground for the inquisitive listener. With four easy steps including Musical Breathwork™, this monthly social engagement invites better flow for communications with yourself, to regulate emotions which in turn helps with biomarkers such as your blood pressure level, and to enjoy concert music more fully.

Want to notice the beauty of the music, elevate your listening skills, and get in touch with your creative mode?

Self-Awareness

Musical self-expression is the result of integrating ideas and concepts we gather about ourselves, our relationships, and our purpose in the world. When we practice music listening skills, we are working on the same self-awareness skills that will open up our imagination and creativity to find a personal pathway forward, I hope in a way that makes a positive impact in the community.

Mental Practicing through Visualization /Audiation
Music is an incredibly creative tool to practice the mental acts of visualization and audiation. By "audiation" (using a term of E. Gordon), I mean the mental practicing that my uncle/mentor Fei-Ping Hsu and I myself use and teach - an internal realization of music with understanding that integrates temporal, spatial, amplitude intentions of what we are preparing to do and the momentary recall of what we just did. This improves perception and motor skill learning, as well as expands our flexibility to reframe emotional perceptions and release repressed thoughts, sometimes extending into our personal lives. 

Rest and Pacing

Just like in music, it is in the silences that we can process and digest and savor and delight and contemplate. Setting up a rhythm of rest is essential to our health. Career advancement methods often stress the importance of dreaming big, and yet in actual practice, our ability to listen to what our bodies need and pace well, is the endurance factor that will lead to long-term success. Often times, a star is born just at the moment when s/he is ready to give up, releases the internal pressure to meet one's own impossible expectations, and start living out life as is. It is a daily struggle for me to find a wider window of deadlines and to take the time to allow intuition into play, but one that I see to be a necessary skill if we want to encourage creativity.

Balancing Social Media's Effects

In this day and age, social media is required for creatives to connect with our audiences, but we all need some protection against the worry and constant comparisons brought on by social media's "vanity optics" (termed by author Paul Jarvis). We need new ways to manage the chronic stress and diluted focus that is the cost of constant visibility. One solution is to commit to a daily time ratio of social media minutes to deep musical listening.

Book Recommendations for a Creative Mindset

Permission to Feel - Marc Brackett
The Gift of Imperfection - Brené Brown  (available on Audible)
The Creative Habit - Twyla Tharp
The WholeHearted Musician - Dana Fonteneau
Brilliance Beyond Borders - Chinwe Esimai (I'm Ms. Chapter 2.)


Projects Connecting Music, Education, and Health

Program Summary: https://www.yalechina.org/musicalmoments

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Yale-China Midday Musical Moments