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                                               the sound of emotion

Love is The Home /  The Music of Ukraine

3/2/2023

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For the past year,  the inconceivably destructive return of war to Europe has brought horror and shock to the people of Ukraine.  My heart is with the Ukrainian people, those who are bravely resisting the Russian invasion, those who are being forced to flee the fighting in the face of terrible conditions and those who are, or who cry for, the far too many victims.  The loss is unfathomable. 

This past week I have been texting with someone in Kharkiv, Ukraine. After a grueling year in a frontline city, after losing her home and her family, with some destiny at play and of course a bit of technological assistance we happened upon each other’s contact info and communicating with someone who has been experiencing a loss of such a distinct magnitude made me question loss.   I noticed a shift in me, like the aperture of my camera lens rotated.  I was at the beach the other day thinking about this and I could hear the in the deep tones of the tides, and within me, a submarine subconscious voice, clarity, focus.

the love is the home
the voice of nature, music
brings it all back to the love,



I’ve been researching, focusing on helping Ukrainian refugees find a home to build their lives back up.   Furthermore, exploring and appreciating the diverse landscape of Ukrainian music I have found it to be joyful and fierce, energy packed and remarkable.
 

the love is the home,
trusting in the currents, the music of nature
swimming in the love, and connecting with others.


I’ve created a playlist here for you to explore the sounds of this vibrant culture and to support Ukrainian artists and the Ukrainian people.
🇺🇦 Ukrainian Love 💙💛 PLAYLIST - Support Ukrainian Artists
40 songs exploring the wide array of Ukrainian music styles.  

Listen - □□ Ukrainian Love □□ PLAYLIST
Also check out: 

Music Defends Ukraine
https://shpytal.com/musicians-defend-ukraine/

And 

This portal brings together calls for donations from the (I)NGO community in Ukraine and neighboring countries, with the aim of connecting with the actions from the philanthropic sector.
https://ngoforukraine.eu/
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booksmart music motivation

1/14/2023

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 Benefits of Listening to Music While Studying

Are you one of the many students at campuses nationwide walking around with earbuds in or headphones on, knowing that music affects your mood and can help you cope with the multiple layers of university stress?  Have you taken the extra step to craft a playlist as study-aid?  

Music can help you feel relaxed, and it may also help improve your focus. Additionally, listening to instrumental music may help stimulate the brain for improved concentration and reduced boredom .

Perhaps you have to read for hours because there’s an assignment deadline approaching. This buildup of stress can lead to anxiety making the process of reading counterproductive. Reading is an exercise that requires full attention and it is best to minimize distraction.  One might think that music could be a distraction and with some types of music that might be the case but putting the right instrumental mood music on in the background can help you destress by raising the level of endorphins in your blood and make it easier to comprehend and retain the information. Calming sounds can serve as white noise and drown out other distracting noises such as restless roommates, neighbors or one’s own wandering mind.  
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in the study zone

Studying can become monotonous and some brain candy can help break you out of the spell and stimulate both sides of the brain simultaneously. 
Most stimulating input is often taken in by either our right, creative brain hemisphere, or by the left left side which is more analytical.  The corpus callosum is what connects the two hemispheres and when listening to music a distinctive activation occurs that stimulates both sides of the brain at once. This enhanced brain function allows for greater storage of information and releases beneficial endorphins like serotonin that promote well-being and relaxation.

Increased relaxation and lower levels of stress can lift spirits, help you feel optimistic when staring at the large text book on your desk or for those times when you aren’t feeling so confident that you’ll be able to fill pages with meaningful words for the research paper.  Having the right music on may be the extra motivational energy burst you need to stay in the study zone  because the brain often associates music with positive experiences and when you’re in a good frame of mind it is typically easier to focus on a task.
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study buddy

Big exam coming up? Some people claim that music can be too distracting.  Some music that has a lot of lyrics or is obnoxious or even too sleep inducing could pull focus but you know what else is distracting… Stress and the daunting task of sifting through lengthy volumes of intellectually challenging material!

The right selection of music can help reduce stress, keep your mind from wandering and even make you feel more confident. Several studies discovered that music has a powerful triple-action on your heart rate, brain activity and release of biochemical stress-reducing effects (Cervellin & Lippi, 2011). suggesting that music enhances cognitive function, stimulating the brain to be more alert and increase knowledge retention.

Consider a custom playlist as a musical companion during your studies. Especially instrumental songs with no lyrics (For & Embrey, 1972)  Some people believe only classical music can work to your advantage while studying which is mostly due to Dr Gordon Shaw’s “Mozart Effect”. Poised on the findings that the IQ of a student group had improved just by listening to Mozart’s “Sonata for Two Pianos in D Major” constantly. But studies also show that electronic music for students improves concentration.

Playing music while you study can make it more interesting , especially for those subjects that you find less than enjoyable which will give you more endurance to keep you focused on completing your assignments.
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For Spotify users, here is the Study Hall playlist I created, a collection of engaging indie electronica instrumentals, with beats to keep you alert and repetitive melodies to relieve stress and aid concentration.

STUDY HALL playlist on Spotify
Listen
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listening to nature : sunset crows

9/13/2022

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Birds of a Feather - a poem inspired by the sound of crows

birds of a feather in the kitchen together, 
we all share this meal,  we've made a life, a pie,
many hands in the mix

another crow homeward at the end of the day,
the sunset hour when the veils of light and shadow
blend like cake batter

your echoing cry and my wing beats together in the blender
whipped up a thick recipe
a sound pouring over us

these crows in the kitchen, a sunset parade
my daydream traveler come home to me
you live in my heart

birds of a feather in the kitchen together
what will we create next? your birthday cake?
it could be any day to celebrate your flight, your music,
your echoing call across the canyon country,
from coast to coast
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all the crows coming home at the end of the day
we share stories, we hear ourselves in each other's words
we the family, makin' cakes
birds of a feather in the kitchen together
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Saved By A Song - Mary Gauthier's inspiring new book

6/6/2022

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Part memoir, part look into the healing power of songwriting... author and performing songwriter Mary Gauthier's book Saved by a Song : The Art and Healing Power of Songwriting potently delivers a heartwarming display on how songwriting can soothe the wounds of the creator and  listener.  

I particularly like following Mary's journey from discovering songwriting as a means to communicate about her own traumas to the honorable service of songwriting with veterans to help them give a voice to their own story.  Through recalling her troubled past as an adopted child and her struggles with substance abuse, without oversweetening but far from minimizing,  Mary describes her creation of songs and lyrics as a therapeutic force in her life . 

 “Witnessing other people’s lives through stories is a kind of medicine, and the magic is getting the story emotionally honest.”    - Mary Gauthier

This has been a uniquely meaningful book for me to read.  It does not exactly lay out the nuts and bolts of how to write a song. In other words, this book is not for songwriting techniques, chord progressions, melodic notation,  verse/chorus formats and such…which is fine, there's plenty of other books for that and Saved By A Song's honest approach is what makes this personal story of songwriting so valuable.  In the book, she is basing her songwriting on the emotional landscape of expression, the motivation there is more inspiring then reliant on rigid templates, it’s the source to say what needs to be said through song.  Mary reminds us that her collegue Ralph Murphy said “It’s not your job to sing the listeners your diary.  Your job is to sing to the listeners theirs.” 

The book is for songwriters and artists of all kinds, therapists and even mental health professionals.  Mary's book helps one understand that one can be saved by a song but also that the world can be changed by a song. Saved By a Song is a heartwarming story, an easily comprehensible philosophy on why songwriting is important, and a solid source of  inspiration.

“artists are like firemen; when the rest of the world is running away from the explosion, they run to it and report back...
                 The ask is this: no matter how many songs you’ve written - each time, the struggle is to get back to that singular place where it is just you and the fire alone in the room.”   
                                                                                                                        - Mary Gauthier
 

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PSYCHOLOGY OF SOUND :  TONE OF VOICE

11/18/2021

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We are a world of sound, vibrationally communicating with each other and our surrounding environment.  The power of words is held in their definition as well as in their delivery.  The way we produce our words and the tone that they are delivered with directly affects our communication with one another. 

My fascination with this began with the foundational aspects of music; melody, meter, the sound of emotion, and essentially, tonal vibrations.  With this sense as a guide for communication and listening,  one can develop an awareness of how spoken words carry more meaning than just their definition.

Exploring the field of how vibrations communicate emotions, one can develop a sense of how words affect a conversation and how they act in resonance or dissonance within a single person or in a relationship.  This experience is like being a piece of an orchestral movement, with your unique instrument, harmonizing with the thematic melody.

Resonance / Dissonance

How do our emotions affect how we deliver our words? How do the vibrations of our voice affect our listener’s nerves?  We listen to voices and words simultaneously, and consciously as well as somatically and subconsciously. Dissonance happens when the tone of voice clashes with your emotion, two notes that don’t blend well, don’t sound good together.  We can notice dissonance, sometimes from passive aggression, between the different ways that someone else communicates, and we are left with a sometimes confusing, conflicted, and perhaps traumatized feeling.  While on the other hand, we notice resonance in a tone of voice and are often left with a peaceful, uplifting feeling. 

Good Vibes / Conversation as Song

Our tone of voice can be in alignment with somatic experiences like fears and turn-ons.
Certain tones of voice can vibrationally resonate with you, like how vibrations resonate in the body of a guitar.  In these situations you might find yourself thinking that a certain feeling “resonates with me”.  When you are on the same page as the person you are talking with, you are attuned and the tones of your voices can resonate with each other and you can be in harmony like two separate tones that harmonize together in a song.  This is an important skill to develop your tone of voice to play your distinct role in the orchestral movement. This can be a conversation, a business meeting, customer service and other situations where you want to instill a certain feeling which you can tailor to the unique recipient in the performer / audience relationship. 

Each conversation brings its own topic to light through tone of voice, the underlying sentiment or frustrations that are being communicated with dynamic vibrational delivery.  The sounds/vibrations of emotion in conjunction with the way in which words are formed themselves determine vibrational receiving of the message.  When we talk to a baby or a cute puppy we automatically manipulate our voices to be higher pitched, to sound sweet and gentler. 

Not only do we choose words to say to one another but we express how we feel through our tone of voice.  Often unaware of the way we might sound to the person we are talking to until it’s too late, because we may think that we are effectively masking our inner feelings, and furthermore, we may have even been masking them from ourselves. 

The tone of voice can be a distraction from content.  What if we made a conscious effort to deliver our words with a tone of voice that enhanced the conversation instead of sweeping it up in a wave of emotion? Is this conscious verbal economy sustainable?  What if we ask ourselves what we want to be communicating through the tone of our voices alongside the actual words?  

Physiological Response

Licensed Therapist Stephanie Mae Neilson describes tone as communication in and of itself; Tone of voice is its own conversation, the felt conversation, the known conversation that doesn’t make it into the words. This conversation is always happening within, alongside, in tandem with, the words and meanings level of the dialogue. This is the conversation of the animal self, the body, of the nonverbal,  preverbal realm. The animal body has vibrational exchange with the animal body of someone else. This content and energy of the exchange can be accepted no matter whether “good” or “bad” , as long as there is no dissonance between content, energy. Words can be chosen intentionally in order to direct vibration through the correct instrument, like sending air through a pipe organ.

Embedded Tone

Words shape sound. Choosing words intentionally to shape tone is a quality of an instrument.  It gives the speaker a choice in how sound is channeled, alleviating some of the pressure from the body to project, accent or blow through sound to create vibrations. Some words carry their own tone, an added complexity to intentional vocalizations.  Words can sound condescending, patronizing, sarcastic, manipulative and confusing.  The tone of the words can create cognitive dissonance if they are used in a way that is misaligned with the meaning of the word or used as part of an act. Explosive words, harsh words and expletives blast their way through a conversation and can be damaging while soft and sweet toned words imply a certain tenderness.  Certain words are built for delivering a message regardless of how you say them because they have an embedded tone.

Love Language / Tone as a Tool

We can use tone as a tool. We have choices in speech and listening. Are you, or is the other, communicating from a place of safety and security in the physical body? The sound of security in a voice and strength in a voice can help someone who is struggling with fear or paranoia. Forced shifts in one’s tone of voice can lead to confidence and ability to be seen or get needs met.  What would high versus low pitch or fast versus slow ask for from the listener?
Beneficial Tonalities . How can vibrations aid in a challenging conversation?  We can be mindful of how we use our voice to shift the energy of one another or match the energy of one another. How do you respond to speaking with someone who is highly anxious and speaks with a higher pitched tone versus someone who is grounded and happy versus someone who is depressed speaking with a droning low tone? The awareness of the way we produce our words and with what tone they are delivered with has the potential to benefit our well being, our relationships and our businesses. 

Join the Conversation

What experience have you had that has been influenced significantly by tone of voice?

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what does the sound of your voice look like?

11/8/2021

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Chrome Music Lab is an interactive website that makes music creation more accessible through fun, hands-on experiments.
Explore music and its connections to science, math, art, and more.

You can make your own songs and save them with the Song Maker experiment as I've done here: 
( click to play ) 

 You can play with these experiments across devices – phones, tablets, laptops – just by opening the site on a web browser such as Chrome and explore the visuals of sound and more with the Chrome Music Lab  ( << click to explore ) 
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Here's what my voice looks like: 
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what does your voice look like?
take a screenshot of it and tag #magneticwestmusic and #chromemusiclab on Instagram for a chance to win some music prizes. 
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Algorithm of the Saints

1/26/2021

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MTV,  the jukebox of my childhood,  created the soundtrack to our household.  It was the stream that kept a creative culture afloat in my life despite my underdeveloped taste in music.  Nonetheless, even at that age I could feel that it was an important piece of my media consumerism.  A song would pop up every once in a while that my older sister would want turned up. I was learned by example that music discovery was a valuable adolescence right of passage.   

One autumn day in 1990 a beat resonated in my heart, it moved me.  There I was, just 12 years old, watching an opening scene featuring the percussion ensemble of Paul Simon’s Obvious Child, it made me feel so much excitement for creativity and human spirit that it surely shaped my passion for music and art.  To just say that the album that it belonged to, Rhythm of The Saints,  became the core soundtrack to my life for the next few years, might be an understatement because it was also an inspiration to me as a songwriter, and now I know that if it weren’t for MTV I might not have experienced the discovery of it the same way.  The convergence of the music with the video and the playlist programming of MTV played a big role in the discovery.  

These days, with discovery being primarily an algorithm based shuffle, music discovery is much more technologically developed. I look at the first run in this world as Pandora, where the radio station that you created would offer new songs that fit the playlist, songs that you may have not heard before.  

The intuitive machine behind music streaming powerhouse Spotify took this to a new level by widening the circle to have the analytical programming include much more independent music and therefore more to discover that you normally wouldn’t find elsewhere.  

In a league of its own, YouTube created another level of intimate videos, a world of personal music discovery with their algorithms suggesting covers and originals by artists in their bedroom or backyard.  YouTube is perhaps the best example of the evolution of the music video convergence in today’s algorithmic music consumerism since the time of MTV.  The algorithm of YouTube dictates what you watch 70% of the time. 81% of American YouTube users say they regularly watch videos recommended by the algorithm according to the article “Many Turn to YouTube for Children’s Content, News, How-To Lessons”  by the Pew Research Center, Washington, D.C. (NOVEMBER 7, 2018) 

The second largest force for me from the pre-streaming era of music discovery was from movies. Soundtracks were developed and led people to fall in love with songs that supported the stories they adored.  How does this come into play now for music discovery with movie streaming giants such as Netflix?  Are more people discovering music from TV and movies nowadays? 

I feel confident that algorithmic music consumerism will continue to develop with more analytical data that is received from the listener's devices.  Could there also be a resurgence in good old word-of-mouth music discovery as music appreciation develops alongside the robotic feed of music?  Will there be a wholehearted response to the technological push that streaming services deliver?

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tone of voice

1/22/2021

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When we talk, how does it sound?  

Does it feel like a love language or does it feel like a challenge?  Each conversation brings its own topic to light through tone of voice, the underlying sentiment or frustrations that are being communicated with dynamic vibrational delivery.  

Not only do we choose worlds to say to one another but we express how we feel through our tone of voice.  Often unaware of the way we might sound to the person we are talking to, until it’s too late.  What if we made a conscious effort to deliver our words with a tone of voice that enhanced the conversation instead of sweeping it up in a wave of emotion?  What if we ask ourselves what we want to be communicating through the tone of our voices alongside the actual words?  

Some words carry their own tone, an added complexity to intentional vocalizations.  Explosive words, harsh words and expletives blast their way through a conversation and can be damaging while soft and sweet toned words imply a certain tenderness.  These words are built for delivering a message regardless of how you say them.

Just try and say “ I love fuzzy bunnies”  with an angry explosive tone.  Do you believe the tone or the words?  Does the message work? 
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Tweek the Creaksbox

1/19/2021

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Creaksbox by Hidden Orchestra + Animita Designs

Creaksbox is an online music manipulator machine using the music soundtrack from CREAKS a new video game by Animita Designs.  The maestro of Creaksbox is Hidden Orchestra’s Joe Acheson who played many instruments on the soundtrack.  The Creaksbox site describes it as  “ a music player for an adaptive soundtrack. There are hundreds and thousands of variables, which creates a ‘living soundtrack’  that feels fresh every time you hear it” 

Ever since I first entered the world of Machinarium, the award-winning independent adventure puzzle game featuring Josef the adorable robot, I have been enchanted by the use of sound and music in the games.  The creative team at Animita Design has brought to life intricate musical convergences in their games where sound is magic, tones are language.  In Samorost 3, the depth of this convergence goes even further as I have written about here.  CREAKS follows suit, with more music convergences to reveal language and puzzles as well as the soundtrack to support the mystery of the game’s story. 

The Creaksbox gives you the chance to explore the tonal landscape in unique ways by tweeking with the controls to constantly blend pieces of the soundtrack together.
It weaves the tracks and shifts the 6 needle record player head which crawls through the grooves of an animated vinyl record like a creepy robotic spider in true Anamita Design fashion. 
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Flip the progress changer toggle and advance the time clock even more to manipulate the sounds even more to a web of melodies, lots of eerie clarinet reminiscent of Samorost 3 and often,  chaotic mixes of electro arpeggios. Open the instrument info. tab for pictures of the featured instruments created by the Creaksbox artist, Jan Chlup. 
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Strat by choosing a length of time to have it running and tweek the Creaksbox yourself to create a soundtrack and unlock your own mysterious treasure.  What stories might the sound evoke for you? 

http://creaksbox.amanita-design.net/
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Inside Sound

11/29/2020

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we are sound chambers.

I can always hear it behind my thoughts, just waiting there for me patiently.  

It is a pulse. 

​Music moves me and intends to even when I am too darn heavy to budge. 


There are songs that are particularly inspiring to me, music that opens me like a piece of fruit.  The rind just peels away and I spread each juicy section of my emotions splashing out.  Finally, I explode, turning inside out by an intricately crafted arrangement of vibrations.  When I allow music to move through me like this then I become the instrument.  My body resonates like the hollow wooden body of an acoustic guitar. 

We are all sound chambers for one voice or another.  When we let sounds bounce around inside us we keep that vibration going, like we collectively step on the sustain pedal of a piano. 

the giant guitar

On several occasions, my 12 year old son and I like to entertain each other by talking about a giant guitar.  One so large that, as it lays there in some wide open west coast valley, or better yet, at a proper establishment for such a creation like The Clark, you have to look at its entirety from a distance.  We imagine you can set a ladder against it and climb up to the top surface, plant your feet there and stare across the girth of the gleaming metal strings, down into the sound hole like it’s some sci-fi, space station on an alien planet.  

Here’s where the idea has steeped enough to step into.  Lowering yourself down into the hole you hang from the largest string, the bass, and once your body relaxes a bit, you let go.  The string, which, to scale, would be a large metal cable, like the kind used to build bridges, vibrates with such a fantastically Earth shaking shutter that the sound chamber that you are dropping into becomes so thick with vibrations you could almost feel it slow down your fall.  Gravity itself is denied by the levity of reverberating sound.  You float down as the sound waves disperse into the open air and gently land.  Inside the great hall of the instrument, the music swallows you.  The light patterns in the room are shifting with the skylight sound-hole. 

A part of you may never want to leave.  The part of you that will pay respect to the new discovery inside the echo chamber.  The other part of you that perhaps wants coffee or to hold close to one you love will get you headed home but most likely with a new way to listen.   

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    Author

    Mike Caruso
    writes with a fascination of sound + music, it's emotional connection to life and the convergence of music to  media + lifestyle.

    THE SOUND
    of EMOTION
     
    -----------

    M U S I C
    M A K E S
    T H E 
    M O M E N T



     #MusicMakesTheMoment
     #TheSoundofEmotion  #MusicisLove
    #MusicinMotion

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